THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 


;  • 


MAURICE   HEWLETT 

BEING  A  CRITICAL  REVIEW  OF 
HIS  PROSE  AND  POETR  Y  %  %  % 
BY  MILTON  BRONNER,  %    %    %    % 

AUTHOR    OF   "LETTERS    FROM   THE    RAVEN" 


BOSTON,  JOHN  W.  LUCE 
AND    COMPANY,   MCMX 


Copyright,  1910, 

by  L.  E,  BASSETT 

Bo9ton,  Mass.  U.  S,  A. 


TO 

MY  FATHER 


715758 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

Chapter  Page 

Biographical  Note   i 

I.     Earthwork  Out  of  Tuscany   g 

II.     Poems    •   21 

III.  The  Forest  Lovers   35 

IV.  Pan  And  The  Young  Shepherd  ...   46 

V.     Little  Novels  of  Italy    59 

VI.  Richard  Yea  and  Nay   ...........   71 

VIII.     The  Queen's  Quair  99 

VII.     New  Canterbury  Tales    87 

IX.  The  Road  In  Tuscany    ....••••...  120 

X.     The  Brazenhead  Cyclus   132 

XI.  The  Fool  Errant 139 

XII.  The  Stooping  Lady    ..•••• 154 

XIII.  The  Spanish  Jade   168 

XIV.  Halfway   House    176 

XV.     Open  Country,  etc 187 

XVI.     Conclusion    ig5 


A  BIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE. 


THERE  are  very  few  writers  of  today, 
who  have  produced  so  much  fine  work, 
concerning  whom  so  little  is  known  as  in 
the  case  of  Mr.  Maurice  Hewlett.  The  liter- 
ary journals  have  been  singularly  free  from  the 
gossip  so  usual  in  th,e  case  of  an  author  whose 
books  have  come  to  be  recognized  as  events 
of  more  than  ordinary  importance.  The  reti- 
cence of  the  man  is  best  summed  up  in  his 
own  modest  words : 

"I  have  refused  to  give  journalists  any  de- 
tails of  my  personal  history  or  private  circum- 
stances, because  I  felt  that  they  were  trading 
upon  mere  notoriety  and  proposing  to  feed  the 
public  with  what  was  not  good  for  it — even  if 
it  had  an  appetite.  The  business  of  critics,  is  to 
criticise  a  writer  as  such,  and  not  help  out 
h,is  esthetic  with  facts  which  have  really  noth- 
ing to  do  with  the  maker.  I  could  write 
novels  with  one  eye  quite  as  well  as  I  could 
with  two." 

To  a  certain  extent,   of  course,   Mr.   Hew- 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

lett  is  correct  in  his  attitude.  But  there  are 
certain  things  concerning  an  author  which  it 
is  perfectly  legitimate  to  know.  It  helps  the 
reader  and  student  to  reach,  a  just  conclusion, 
when  he  knows  something  about  the  family 
history,  the  education,  and  the  tastes  of  the 
author  under  consideration. 

"Who's  Who,"  that  friend  of  th,e  busy  edi- 
tor, does  very  little  to  satisfy  this  legitimate 
curiosity.  One  will  find  scores  of  lesser 
authors  more  fully  treated  than  the  subject 
of  this  book.  Here  is  what  it  tells : — "Maurice 
Henry  Hewlett:  Keeper  of  Land  Revenue 
Records  and  Enrolments,  1896-1900;  born, 
January  22,  1861 ;  eldest  son  of  Henry  Gay 
Hewlett  of  Shaw  Hill,  Addington,  Kent;  mar- 
ried Hilda  Beatrice,  second  daughter  of  Rev. 
George  William  Herbert.  Educated,  London 
International  College,  Spring  Grove,  Isles- 
worth.  Barrister,  1891.  Publications:  "Earth- 
work Out  of  Tuscany,"  1895;  "The  Masque  of 
Dead  Florentines,"  1895;  "Songs  and  Medita- 
tions," 1897;  "The  Forest  Lovers,"  1898;  "Pan 
and  the  Young  Shepherd,"  1898;  "Little  Novels 
of  Italy,"  1899;  "Richard  Yea  and  Nay,"  1900; 
"New  Canterbury  Tales,"  1901 ;  "The  Queen's 
Quair,"  1904;  "The  Road  in  Tuscany,"  1904; 


A  BIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE 

"Fond  Adventures,"  1905 ;  "The  Fool  Errant," 
1905;  "Th,e  Stooping  Lady,"  1907. 

If  to  this,  are  added  "The  Spanish  Jade" 
and  "Halfway  House,"  igo8;  "Artemision" 
and  "Open  Country,"  1909,  the  list  is  com- 
plete. 

Mr.  Hewlett  is  in  many  ways  English  of 
the  English.  The  family  had  land  in  the  bor- 
ders of  Somerset  and  Dorset  for  many  cen- 
turies. In  fact,  there  is  a  person  by  the  name 
of  Hewlett  mentioned  in  the  Domesday  Book 
of  Somerset  as  holding  land  there  and  as  hav- 
ing held  it  in  the  time  of  Edward  the  Confes- 
sor. It  was  a  great  grandfather  of  the  novelist 
who  left  the  country  and  settled  in  London. 
So  far  back  as  it  has  been  possible  to  trace, 
the  Hewletts  have  always  been  Puritans  and 
Whigs.  Mr.  Hewlett's  grandparents  were 
strictly  so.  His  father  fell  under  the  influence 
of  Dr.  Martineau  and  called  himself  nothing 
more  definite  than  a  theist.  Mr.  Hewlett's 
grandmother  was  one  of  the  Gays  of  Norfolk, 
a  Huguenot  French  family.  His  father  bore 
the  name,  Henry  Gay  Hewlett,  and  it  is  not  a 
little  curious  that  in  the  novelist's  first  great 
popular  success,  "The  Forest  Lovers,"  the 
hero  bore  th,e  name  Prosper  le  Gai. 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

Henry  Gay  Hewlett,  the  father  of  the  novel- 
ist, was  a  student  all  his  life,  a  writer  of 
verses,  and  a  critic  of  no  mean  ability.  It  is 
with  no  little  interest  that  one  picks  up  the 
Contemporary  Review,  of  December,  1874  to 
read  a  critique  by  H.  G.  Hewlett  upon  the 
poems  of  William  Morris.  One  can  readily 
believe  that  a  precocious  boy,  such  as  the 
novelist  is  said  to  have  been,  would  be  in- 
tensely interested  in  the  magazine  contribu- 
tions by  his  father.  The  elder  Hewlett,  no 
less  than  the  present  one,  was  interested  in 
medieval  topics.  It  was  this,  doubtless,  which 
caused  the  poems  of  Morris  to  appeal  to  him, 
at  the  same  time  that  he  deprecated  the  poems 
of  Swinburne,  so  savagely  flayed  in  the  same 
magazine  by  Robert  Buchanan. 

Maurice  Henry  Hewlett,  the  eldest  son  of  a 
large  family  of  children,  must  have  been  re- 
marked early  as  one  apt  to  follow  in  the  foot- 
steps of  his  father  and  grandfather,  both  of 
whom  were  students  of  black  letter  law.  As 
early  as  the  family  can  remember,  Maurice 
Hewlett  began  to  read  and  to  scribble.  The 
first  book  which  he  was  noticed  reading  was 
significantly  enough  the  "Morte  D'Artur. 
At  one  time  he  knew  it  by  heart  and  it  un- 


A  BIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE 

doubtedly  had  an  influence  not  only  upon  h,is 
future  style,  but  upon  his  future  studies. 
Somewhere  Mr.  Hewlett  says  that  he  read 
Shakespeare  very  early,  "Tom  Jones"  too 
early,  and  French  when  he  was  fourteen.  He 
read  practically  no  poetry  until  he  was  25. 
As  the  net  result  of  his  reading,  he  has  given 
it  as  his  opinion  that  his  literary  sponsoring 
was  t  Mallory,  the  Bible,  Quixote  in  English, 
Sir  Thomas  Browne  and  Carlyle.  The  poets 
whp  influenced  his  style  were  Keats,  Shelly, 
Dante  and  the  Italians  of  Dante's  time.  The  lad 
was  educated  largely  in  private  schools. 
School  life,  as  such,  was  not  much  to  his  taste 
and  he  cared  little  for  the  ordinary  routine 
lessons.  He  ended  his  student  days  without 
a  university  degree.  He  says  of  this  time  of 
his  life:  "I  wasted  my  time,  I  dreamed;  I  tried 
to  do  things  too  big  for  me,  and  threw  them 
up  at  the  first  failure;  I  diligently  pursued 
every  false  God;  I  don't  think  I  was  very 
happy,  and  I  am  sure  I  was  very  disagreeable ; 
I  doubt  now  if  I  was  ever  a  boy,  except  for  a 
short  period  when  by  rights  I  should  have 
been  a  man." 

While  he  was  dreaming  and  reading,  he  was 
also  writing  by  fits  and  starts.     As  a  lad  he 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

was  supposed  by  his  fond  family  to  be  able 
to  imitate  anybody.  It  is  recorded  of  him  that 
he  once  greatly  surprised  a  lady  who  invited 
him  to  a  young  folks'  croquet  party,  by  res- 
ponding in  Latin  in  the  style  of  a  letter  in 
Sallust  or  Livy.  He  was  about  15  at  the 
time  and  with  something  like  enthusiasm  for 
Latin.  Later  on  he  copied  the  manner  of 
Plato  and  at  the  age  of  18  began  the  study 
of  law,  but  took  his  time  about  it,  not  being 
finally  called  to  the  bar  until  1891.  By  then, 
he  was  not  only  thoroughly  acquainted  with 
law  itself — a  fondness  for  which  shows  itself 
in  his  novels — not  only  familiar  with  English 
and  French  literature,  but  had  begun  that 
study  of  Italian  which  was  to  become  such  a 
passion  with  him.  About  this  time  he  fell  ill 
and  took  those  brief  trips  abroad  which  were 
so  largely  to  affect  his  subsequent  career. 
Contrary  to  th,e  generally  accepted  opinion, 
the  longest  visit  he  has  ever  paid  Italy  was 
but  of  two  months  duration.  Upon  his  return 
in  better  health,,  he  began  the  practice  of  his 
profession.  Fitly  enough,  he  lectured  on 
medieval  thought  and  art  at  the  South  Ken- 
sington University  College  and  wrote  re- 
views for  the  critical  journals  upon  subjects 


A  BIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE 

which  were  congenial  to  him.  As  a  reviewer 
he  was  by  no  means  gentle.  Th,e  same  hon- 
esty of  purpose  which  has  led  him  to  call  a 
spade  a  spade  in  his  novels,  led  him  to  pursue 
a  similar  course  in  his  reviewing  work.  It 
is  only  necessary  to  take  one  example:  In  1896, 
the  year  after  his  "Earthwork"  and  the  year 
in  which  he  secured  a  position  in  the  Treas- 
ury Department,  Vernon  Lee,  a  well  known 
writer  on  aesthetic  subjects,  issued  a  book 
entitled  "Renaissance  Fancies  and  Studies." 
It  so  happens  that  Miss  Violet  Paget  (Vernon 
Lee)  is  rather  unappreciative  of  Botticelli,  one 
of  Mr.  Hewlett's  heroes.  This  stirs  him  to 
some  vigourous  writing  in  his  review  in  the 
Academy  of  March  21,  1896,  one  interesting 
passage  being  as  follows:  "Her  chapter  on 
Imaginative  Art  in  th,e  Renaissance,  for  in- 
stance, proceeds  upon  a  fallacy.  A  thing  is 
not  imaginative  because  you  get  imaginative 
stimulus  out  of  it.  The  imaginative  man 
needs  much  less  than  a  Giottesque  fresco  to 
set  his  soul  traveling.  Indeed,  one  would  be 
inclined  to  say  that  imagination  was  most 
nourished  by  the  work  it  had  to  do,  by  the 
need  to  fend  for  itself.  *  *  A  child  will  ride 
to  h,eaven  on  a  broomstick;  but  the  broom- 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

stick  does  not  take  him.    He,  on  the  contrary, 
takes  the  broomstick." 

The  rest  of  Mr.  Hewlett's  career  since  the 
success  of  his  "Forest  Lovers"  and  his  resigna- 
tion from  the  Land  Revenue  office  is  simply 
one  of  literary  work,  his  time  being  engaged 
in  the  production  of  his  novels. 


8 


EARTHWORK  OUT  OF  TUSCANY. 


THERE  is  an  apocryphal  story  concerning 
Whistler  which  runs  something  like  this : 
A  slight  acquaintance  brought  up  a 
friend  whom  he  wished  to  present  to  th,e  great 
painter. 

"Mr.  Whistler,  this  is  Mr.  Smith." 

"I  don't  care,"  replied  Whistler  as  he  moved 
away. 

Presumably  some  of  the  I-don't-care-to- 
know-you  spirit  possessed  the  critics  at  the 
time  Mr.  Hewlett's  first  book — "Earthwork 
Out  of  Tuscany" — appeared.  A  notice  in  the 
Athenaeum  of  June  15,  1895  is  representative 
of  the  reception  accorded  the  book  by  the 
critics: 

"  'Earthwork  Out  of  Tuscany,'  by  Maurice 
Hewlett  (Dent  &  Company)  will  not,  we  fear, 
appeal  to  many  readers.  Mr.  Hewlett  writes 
mainly  of  Florence,  a  city  that  has  been 
'more   written   about'   than   any   out  of   Italy, 

excepting  Cairo.     His  impressions  and  trans- 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

lations  are  not  interesting,  and  his  style  is 
frequently  affected  and  disagreeable.  Th,e 
best  that  can  be  said  of  the  book  is  that  it 
shows  a  very  proper  sympathy  with  much  that 
is  good  in  art ;  but  this  will  not  make  the  book 
a  good  one.  In  one  place  tb,e  author  modestly 
speaks  of  his  writings  as  watered  wine,  and 
we  must  confess  his  modesty  is  not  unbecom- 
ing." 

Today  the  weight  of  Maurice  Hewlett's 
name  would  doubtless  cause  the  most  cock- 
sure of  his  critics  to  pause  before  dismissing 
a  book,  from  his  hand,  in  any  such  cavalier 
fashion;  whjle  even  the  dullest  of  them  would 
recall  that  the  spell  of  Italy  has  whistled  off 
the  creative  imagination  of  every  man  of  let- 
ters who  has  breathed  her  air.  To  each  she 
h,as  given  some  secret  of  her  soul,  though  to 
no  two  of  them  has  the  same  whispered  mes- 
sage of  enchantment  come. 

Italy  to  Byron  represented  the  land  where 
a  Lucretia  Borgia  wrote,  "the  prettiest  love 
letters  in  the  world"  to  Cardinal  Bembo,  and 
he  heartily  wished  h,imself  a  Cardinal.  To 
Shelley,  it  meant  Milan  with  its  cathedral  and 
a  quiet  corner  in  it  where  he  could  read  his 
Dante.    Heine,  creating  figures  of  women  and 

10 


EARTHWORK  OUT  OF  TUSCANY 

falling  in  love  with  his  fictions,  wrote  of  one 
Italian  city:  "It  seemed  to  me  as  thpugh  the 
whole  town  was  nought  else  than  a  pretty 
novel  that  I  had  once  read — that,  in  truth,  I 
myself  had  created;  and  that  I  was  bewitched 
by  my  own  phantasy,  startled  by  the  pictures 
of  my  own  conjuring." 

To  Landor,  Italy  meant  th,at  country  in 
which  the  little  Assunta  went  bargaining  for 
the  best  olives,  and  where  Petrarch  and  Boc- 
caccio learnedly  discussed  the  merits  and  de- 
fects of  Dante's  work. 

To  Pater,  it  meant  a  place  where  a  few 
great  painters  had  created  masterpieces.  In 
our  day,  it  means  to  Mr.  Arthur  Symons  a 
country  filled  with  cities  that  are,  as  it  were, 
dead  cities,  cities  to  be  considered  as  works 
of  art,  whereas  Mr.  Hewlett  considers  them 
as  works  of  life.  To  Mr.  Symons,  people  are 
non-existent,  or,  if  they  "intrude,"  are  a 
source  of  annoyance. 

To  Mr.  Hewlett,  no  city  is  complete  with- 
out its  visions  of  the  people  who  made  it. 
The  landscape  is  not  perfect  without  its  ap- 
pealing human  figures.  Italy,  as  he  aptly  says 
in  one  place,  is  a  country  in  which  pictures 
were  lived. 


ii 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

He  recreates  that  old  Italy  for  us.  The 
brilliancy  with,  which  he  does  this,  the  sure- 
ness  of  his  touch,,  the  deep  knowledge  of  land, 
people  and  history  that  he  displays,  the  in- 
timacy of  his  revelations,  stamp  him,  not  as  the 
Anglo-Saxon  writing  of  Italy  as  Browning 
did,  as  George  Eliot  did,  but  as  the  most 
Italianate  of  Englishmen. 

His  first  book  smacks  somewhat  of  Pater 
and  Bourget,  with  a  little  of  Lamb  and  of 
Sir  Thomas  Browne,  but  to  many  there  is 
more  of  the  Ruskin  of  the  "Mornings  in  Flor- 
ence" in  it,  than  of  any  of  the  authors  men- 
tioned; revealed  not  so  much  in  the  style  of 
the  English,  as  in  the  manner  in  which  he  ap- 
proaches Italy,  the  joy  he  has  in  the  works  of 
art  that  please  him,  the  good  humour  it  puts 
him  in  to  write  of  it.  As  not  the  least  charm- 
ing part  of  the  "Mornings  in  Florence"  is  the 

humourous  little  preface,  so  not  the  least  de- 
lightful   portion    of    the    "Earthwork"    is    the 

sunny,  light-hearted  "Proem,"  an  "apologia  pro 
libello  suo": — "You  take  a  boy  out  of  school; 
you  set  him  to  book-reading,  give  him  Shakes- 
peare and  a  Bible,  set  him  sailing  in  the  air 
with  the  poets ;  drench  him  with  painter's 
dreams,  via,  Titian's  carmine  and  orange,  Ver- 

12 


EARTHWORK  OUT  OF  TUSCANY 

onese's  rippling  brocades,  Umbrian  morning 
skies,  and  Tuscan  hues  wrought  of  moon- 
beams and  flowing  water — anon  you  turn 
him  adrift  in  Italy,  a  country  where  all  poets' 
souls  seem  to  be  caged  in  crystal  and  set  in 
the  sunw  and  say,  'Here,  dreamer  of  dreams, 
what  of  the  day?'  Madonna!  You  ask  and 
you  shall  obtain.  I  proceed  to  expand  under 
your  benevolent  eye." 

Proceeding,  he  gives  a  criticism  of  some 
painter's  work;  he  exercises  his  ingenuity  in 
discussing  poetry  of  the  15th  century  and 
translating  a  stave  or  two;  possibly  with  Lan- 
dor  in  mind,  he  constructs  one  or  two  imagin- 
ary conversations ;  he  gives  a  romantic  in- 
terpretation of  what  sculptures  mean  to  him, 
and  finally  two  well-nigh  perfect  little  things : 
"Quattrocentisteria,"  and  "A  Sacrifice  at  Pra- 
to,"  which  is  equally  artistic  in  another  vein, 
recalling  to  mind  by  its  sunny  paganism  cer- 
tain golden  pages  in  Pater's  "Marius."  And 
all  these  things  are  written  with  such  gaiety 
of  spirit  one  finds  it  hard  to  realize  that  the 
author  was  not  21  but  33.  The  sun  has  gone 
to  the  head  of  this  sun-worshipper.  Every- 
thing is  attractive  to  him  in  this  sun-soaked 
Tuscany. 

13 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

"I  may  see  my  mistress  Italy  embowered 
in  a  belfry,  a  fresco,  the  scope  of  a  Piazza, 
th,e  lilt  of  a  Stornello,  the  fragrance  of  a  leg- 
end. If  I  don't  find  a  legend  to  hand  I  may, 
as  lief  as  not*  invent  one." 

This  sun-intoxicated  writer  is  not  of  the 
order  of  the  aesthetes.  He  flouts  at  the  sug- 
gestion that  "Art  is  some  pale,  remote  virgin 
who  must  needs  shiver  and  withdraw  at  the 
touch  of  actual  life."  To  him  the  very  founda- 
tion of  all  great  art  is  that  it  springs  from 
actual  life;  it  is  earthiness  touched  to  ethe- 
reality, to  loveliness  supreme,  to  sublimity  by 
the  power  of  genius.  He  uses  his  common 
sense.  In  considering  a  work  of  art  he  asks 
is  it  well  done,  rather  than  is  it  well  inten- 
tioned?  He  does  not  hesitate  to  break  a 
lance  with  Mr.  George  Moore  or  with  Ruskin 
himself,  when  needs  must.  He  will  not 
scruple  to  say  that  Ruskin's  interpretation  of 
Botticelli's  Judith  is  all  wrong  and  boldly  tell 
the  story  he  himself  reads  in  this  fine  work. 
And  as  he  does,  there  drop  such  melodious 
bits  as  this:  "Here,  on  the  weather-fretted 
walls,  a  Delia  Robbia  blossoms  out  in  natural 
colours — blue  and  white  and  green.  They 
are  Spring's  colours.     You  need  not  go  into 


EARTHWORK  OUT  OF  TUSCANY 

the  Bargello  to  understand  Luca  and  Andrea 
at  their  happy  task ;  as  well  go  into  a  botanical 
museum  to  read  the  secret  of  April." 

Mr.  Hewlett  has  called  this  a  book  about 
Tuscany.  Coming  still  closer  to  the  fact,  it 
might  be  said  it  is  about  Botticelli. 

Botticelli  the  man,  Botticelli  the  artist,  and, 
possibly,  Botticelli  the  actor  in  various  little 
life-dramas, — these  are  th,e  main  topics  of  his 
book.  The  painter's  career  is  almost  an  ob- 
session with  Mr.  Hewlett.  He  reverts  to  it 
again  and  again.  He  even  promises  to  write 
at  length  some  day  a  Botticelli  story,  a  promise 
thus  far  not  kept. 

A  glimpse  of  Botticelli  is  caught  in  the 
first  of  Mr.  Hewlett's  "conversations,"  "Of 
Sheep  Shearers,"  a  little  thing  that  presup- 
poses more  knowledge  of  Florentine  art  and 
history  than  th,e  average  reader  is  apt  to 
possess.  Yet,  in  the  second  line,  there  is  such 
a  sentence  as  this,  etching  an  entire  picture: 
"The  little  wistful  mother  spying  for  God  in 
her  first  born." 

In  the  mouth  of  Luca  Signorelli,  Hewlett 
h,as  placed  words  that  give  the  very  attitude 
with  which  the  great  painter  was  met  in  his 
own  day:   " 'Tis  a   dreamer,  sir,  believe  me, 

15 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

a  dreamer  of  virgin  nights,  who  knows  not 
the  oracle  of  a  tense  muscle  nor  the  right 
equivalent  of  a  hairy  chest.  His  gods  are  of 
the  cloister,  and  his  goddesses  have  the  va- 
pours of  a  long-legged  girl  belated  in  the 
nursery;  they  are  all  for  your  tremors  and 
swoonings,  your  lingering,  fingering  embrace- 
ments  of  bosom  friends.  Aphroditissa !  Bones 
of  me,  shall  Aphrodite  languish  in  a  skimpy 
skirt!" 

Then  follow  two  dramatic  conversations  in 
which  are  brief  glimpses  of  Simonetta,  beloved 
of  Giuliano  Medici,  and  of  how  her  fate  was 
involved  in  the  coil  of  Florentine  history. 

And  finally  comes  the  pearl  of  the  book,  the 
lovely  "Quattrocentisteria,  (How  Sandro  Bot- 
ticelli saw  Simonetta  in  the  Spring)." 

As  a  painter  at  the  court  of  Lorenzo  Medici 
there  is  no  doubt  that  Botticelli  saw  Simon- 
etta Vespucci.  With  a  poet's  right,  Mr.  Hew- 
lett has  conceived  an  altogether  probable 
situation  and  beautifully  elaborated  it  into  this 
little  gem.  It  is  hardly  to  be  called  a  short 
story,  a  conte.  Here,  as  everywhere,  Mr. 
Hewlett  has  differed  somewhat  in  method 
from  the  great  prose  stylist,  Pater,  whom 
there  is  every  evidence  to  believe  the  younger 

16 


EARTHWORK  OUT  OF  TUSCANY 

man  admired.  Hewlett's  style  is  all  alive,  all 
glowing,  all  colourful.  In  his  "Imaginary 
Portrait,"  instead  of  gradually,  almost  stealth- 
ily approaching  his  main  theme,  as  Pater 
would  have  done,  he  boldly  pitches  upon  it  in 
the  very  second  paragraph: — 

"Up  at  the  Villa,  with  brisk  morning  airs 
rustling  overhead,  in  the  cool  shades  of  trees 
and  lawns,  it  was  pleasant  to  lie  still,  watch- 
ing these  things  while  a  silky  young  exquisite 
sang  to  his  lute  a  not  too  audacious  ballad 
about  Selvaggia,  or  Becchina  and  the  saucy 
Prior  of  Sant'  Onofrio.  He  sang  well  too, 
that  dark-eyed  boy;  the  girl  at  whose  feet  he 
was  crouched  was  laughing  and  blushing  at 
once ;  and,  being  very  fair,  she  blushed  hotly. 
She  dared  not  raise  her  eyes,  to  look  into  his, 
and  he  knew  it  and  was  quietly  measuring 
his  strength — it  was  quite  a  comedy!  At  each 
wanton  refrain  he  lowered  his  voice  to  a  whis- 
per and  bent  a  little  forward.  And  the  girl's 
laughter  became  hysterical;  she  was  shaking 
with  the  effort  to  control  herself.  At  last  she 
looked  up  with  a  sort  of  sob  in  her  breath 
and  saw  his  mocking  smile  and  the  gleam 
of  the  wild  beast  in  his  eyes.  She  grew  white, 
rose  hastily  and  turned  away  to  join  a  group 

17 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

of  ladies  sitting  apart.  A  man  with  a  heavy, 
rather  sullen  face  and  a  bush  of  yellow  hair 
falling  over  his  forehead  in  a  wave,  was  stand- 
ing aside  watching  all  th,is.  He  folded  his 
arms  and  scowled  under  his  big  brows;  and 
when  the  girl  moved  away  his  eyes  followed 
her." 

*        *        jfr 

"Such  clear-cut,  high  beauty  made  him 
ashamed;  but  her  colouring  (for  h,e  was  a 
painter)  made  his  heart  beat.  She  was  no 
ice-bound  shadow  of  deity  then!  but  flesh  and 
blood;  a  girl,  a  child,  of  timid,  soft  contours, 
of  warm  roses  and  blue  veins  laced  in  a  pearly 
skin.  And  she  was  crowned  with  a  heavy 
wealth,  of  red-gold  hair,  twisted  in  great  coils, 
bound  about  with  pearls,  and  smouldering 
like  molten  metal  where  it  fell  rippling  along 
her  neck." 

So  she  is  seen  in  the  head  painted  by  Bot- 
ticelli,, an  engraving  from  which  graced  the 
original  edition  of  "Earthwork."  No  reader 
can  well  fail  to  perceive  that  here  is  a  writer 
with,  something  to  say;  a  man  possessed  of 
historic  imagination;  a  romanticist  who  can 
recreate  dead  and  gone  periods.  "Quattro- 
centisteria"  is  not  a  very  dramatic  story,  hard- 

18 


EARTHWORK  OUT  OF  TUSCANY 

ly  a  tale  at  all,  and  yet  one  may  find  more  of 
the  real  Renaissance  in  its  few  pages  than  in 
many  chapters  in  Symonds'  more  formal  his- 
tory of  the  Renaissance  in  Italy. 

"A  Sacrifice  at  Prato"  is  in  an  altogether 
different  vein.  It  is  presumably  a  narrative 
by  a  cultured  stranger,  a  citizen  of  the  Roman 
empire,  who  has  traveled  not  only  in  space 
but  in  time  as  well.  Mr.  Hewlett  h.ere  en- 
deavours to  picture  just  how  Catholic  Italy, 
with  its  worship  of  Christ  and  the  Virgin, 
would  strike  the  cultivated  Pagan,  having  an 
intimate  acquaintance  with  all  the  ancient 
Greek  myths.  He  shows  h,ow  at  first  it  seems 
to  the  Pagan  that  the  people  are  rendering 
homage  to  Dionysus  the  Redeemer,  and  to 
Venus  Genetrix,  until  he  learns  that  the  re- 
ligious mainly  worshipped  a  maimed  and  torn 
god,  whose  wounds  are  bleeding,  and  then 
he  knows  it  can  not  be  Dionysus,  but  "must 
needs  be  the  Divine  Eros,  concerning  whom 
Plato's  words  are  yet  with  us.  So  I  can  under- 
stand why  he  is  so  wise,  why  he  suffers  always, 
and  yet  cannot  be  driven  by  torment,  nor  per- 
suaded by  sophisms  to  cease  loving.  For  the 
necessity  of  love  is  to  crave  ever;  and  he  is 
Love  himself." 


19 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

In  this  engaging  style,  the  author  manages 
to  gather  much  of  Italy  between  the  covers  of 
his  little  book.  Some  there  are,  who  perhaps 
imagine  Mr.  Hewlett  spent  long  years  in  Italy 
absorbing  its  spirit  as  the  Brownings  did.  But 
in  this  th,ey  are  mistaken.  Hewlett  has  made 
only  short  vacation  trips  in  what  is  surely 
one  of  the  native  lands  of  his  spirit.  He  has 
a  theory  that  it  is  an  advantage  to  see  a  coun- 
try in  brief  visits.  He  believes  that  while  one 
thus  feels  the  charm  in  every  fibre  of  one's 
being,  he  can  more  easily  pick  out  the  great, 
salient  facts  about  a  land  and  its  people. 

However  that  may  be,  "Earthwork"  is  in- 
deed builded  of  Italian  earth ;  it  is  genuine ; 
there  is  no  make-believe.  And  whether  this 
is  seen  in  the  ligh,t  of  after  events  or  no,  the 
book  seems  to  have  within  its  pages  the  seed 
of  all  the  various  kinds  of  artistry  Mr.  Hew- 
lett was  to  bring  to  bear  later  upon  larger  and 
more  important  works. 


20 


A  MASQUE  OF  DEAD  FLORENTINES. 

SONGS  AND  MEDITATIONS. 

ARTEMISION. 


AMONG  the  first  writings  of  Mr.  Hewlett, 
as  with  so  many  Englishmen  of  letters, 
were  the  poems  written  in  the  first  flush 
of  his  literary  youth,-  The  question  at  once 
suggests  itself,  How  will  this  devotee  of  the 
old  things,  this  weaver  of  arras-like  pictures, 
write  as  a  poet?  In  some  of  his  finest  prose 
he  is  a  Greek  Pagan  by  way  of  the  Italian 
Renaissance.  In  his  early  poetry,  does  he 
display  the  same  passion  for  rich  English,, 
even  to  the  touch  of  preciosity?  Is  he  marked 
by  the  love  of  lovely  words  until  one  imagines 
him  exclaiming  fervently, — "I  thank  Heaven 
for  this  beautiful  English  word?" 

These  questions  can  best  be  answered  by  an 
examination  of  his  verse,  by  an  appeal  to  "A 
Masque  of  Dead  Florentines,"  issued  in  1895, 
to  "Songs  And  Meditations,"  published  in 
1896  and  to  "Artemision,"  1909.     Despite  the 

21 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

fact  that  the  publication  date  of  the  "Songs" 
is  later  than  that  of  the  "Masque,"  there  are 
numerous  signs  that  it  is  a  gathering  of  the 
author's  earliest  work. 

The  young  author,  so  soon  afterwards  to 
make  fame  for  himself  as  a  creator  of  entranc- 
ing feminine  characters  in  fiction,  was  at  this 
time  in  love  with  youth  and  young,  growing 
things,  with,  girl  goddesses,  little  children,  and 
fair  flowers.  Seemingly  he  was  scarce  aware 
that  he  dwelt  in  busy,  commercial  England. 
One  must  tread  softly!  Here  in  this  forest 
the  fair  Clytie  mourned.  There  Ariadne  was 
forsaken.  Coming  through  that  coppice,  oh 
wonder  of  wonders!  one  might  intrude  upon 
the  fair  Artemis  herself,  in  all  the  glory  of  her 
deathless  young  body. 

While  the  poet's  dreams  were  mainly  of 
Greece,  and  of  Italy  of  Dante's  day  he  had  read 
and  adored  Keats  and  Shelley.  He  had  studied 
the  early  Italians.  He  was  familiar  with  the 
Elizabethan  and  Jacobean  song-writers.  He 
admired  Donne  and  Crashaw  and  the  courtier 
poets  of  Charles'  day.  At  times  in  h,is  Latinity 
and  his  preference  for  odes,  he  recalls  the  late 
Francis  Thompson.  If  Mr.  Hewlett  is  a  Greek 
Pagan  by  way  of  the  Italian  Renaissance,  ap- 

22 


A  MASQUE  OF  DEAD  FLORENTINES 

propriately  enough  the  "Songs"  contain  many 
Greek  studies.  They  are  Greek  more  often 
not  so  much  in  feeling  as  in  subject,  Greek 
as  a  cultured  Italian  of  the  Renaissance 
would  write.  His  youth,,  his  love  for  nature, 
and  his  English  blood  are  shown  by  the  prod- 
igality with  which  he  adorns  his  pages  with 
fair  English  blossoms.  He  celebrates  th,e 
crocus;  he  writes  a  study  in  white  like  this, 
worthy  of  a  painter  trying  his  hand  at  verse: 

"White  flowers,  white  flowers  to  deck  my 
lady  fair ! 

Clematis  for  her  hair 

A  cluster  of  vale  lilies  for  her  bosom 

With  apple  blossom; 

Th,en  out  of  open  fields  and  grassy  places 

Pick  her  moon-daisies, 

And  make  a  wreath 

With  columbines  and  roses  white  as  death; 

Thus  she  will  be 

Smother'd     in    flower-foam,    and    live    fra- 
grantly." 

Herrick  was  more  graceful  and  a  greater 
poet,  but  he  was  no  fonder  of  flowers. 

The  young  Hewlett  has  conned  his  Cavalier 
poets  and  writes :  "That  Stone  Walls  Can  Nev- 
er Separate  Him  From  His  Lady,"  "His  Lady 

23 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

A  Thief,"  and  "Having  Lost  His  Lady."  In 
memory  of  his  Italian,  he  writes  canzone  and 
stornelli,  and  translates  the  dirge  of  Politian 
for  the  dead  Lorenzo.  There  is  little  here  to 
suggest  the  modern  English,  poet,  save  it  be 
one  in  his  fledgling  years  trying  his  wings, 
imitating  the  old  masters  until  he  finds  him- 
self. The  most  modern  note  in  this  verse  is 
sounded  in  "War  Songs  for  the  English"  in 
which,  America  is  called  upon  to  join  England 
in  a  "rally."  "Ariadne  Forsaken"  has  the 
very  sound  of  some  of  the  great  Greek  choral 
numbers : 

"Woman  that  liveth  to  love,  to  trust,  and 

to  cling, 
Being  forsworn, 
Choketh  the  tears  as  they  start, 
Masketh,  the   glint  of  her  passion,  traileth 

her  wing 
As  a  bird,  grieveth  apart, 
Tearless,  voiceless,  forlorn,. 
Ripple  of  laughing  and  speech  hath  she  to 

love ;  but  to  mourn, 
Tempest  of  sighs,  and  labouring  bosom,  and 

shorn 
Hair,  and  dead  heart." 

24 


A  MASQUE  OF  DEAD  FLORENTINES 

In  an  entirely  different  vein  are  the  closing 
lines  of  his  "Hymn  to  Artemis,"  modern 
where  the  other  is  Greek,  and  one  of  the 
numerous  tributes  paid  by  him  to  women,  as 
fine  as  those  minute  descriptions  scattered 
through  his  prose. 

Contrasting  with  these  pictures  suggested 
by  Greek  subjects  are  the  following  opening 
lines  of  a  poem  entitled  "Donna  E.  Gentil:" 

"Thy  lonely  virginal  air, 

And  thy  vague  eyes, 

The  carven  stillness  of  thy  sorrowful  mouth,, 

And  sanctity  of  thy  youth,        , 

Mark  thee  for  no  man's  prize: 

Set  thee  apart  to  be  fair, 

Holy,  lovely,  and  wise." 

In  this  there  is  the  slow  solemn  music  so 
apt  to  be  associated  with  a  study  of  Dante  or 
a  poem  founded  on  his  words,  although,,  too, 
the  lines  themselves  have  something  of  Ver- 
laine,  when  he  is  purest  and  most  ench?.iting. 
So  again  Dante  suggests  a  poem  and  under  the 
title  "Nessun  Maggior  Dolore"  there  is  this 
version  of  th,e  famous  lines : 

25 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

"Never  a  sharper  grief 

Than  remembrance  of  happy  things 

When  our  misery  stings 

And  wounds  ache  for  relief." 

It  greatly  excells  the  Carey  version: 

"No  greater  grief  than  to  remember  days 
Of  joy,  when  misery  is  at  hand." 

Besides  these  verses,  th,e  book  contains 
chants  from  plays  projected  or,  perhaps,  partly 
finished,  sonnets  and  formal  odes.  Two 
poems  distinguished  by  their  simplicity  best 
indicate  what  direction  Hewlett's  talents  as 
poet  might  have  taken.  One  is  a  "Dirge" 
reminiscent  distantly  of  William  Morris  in 
the  best  Pre-Raphaelite  manner  of  the  Guene- 
vere  volume.  "For  Cecco  Sleepy"  is  an  ex- 
quisite lullaby,  a  tune  of  childhood,  with  a 
drowsy  lilting  melody,  nodding  with  its  repe- 
titions : 

"Cecco's  eyes  begin  to  blink, 
Lay  him  down,  lay  him  down! 
Tired  little  head  must  sink, 
Little  golden  crown. 

26 


A  MASQUE  OF  DEAD  FLORENTINES 

"Cecco  plays  the  valiant  part, 
All  th,e  day,  all  the  day! 
That's  an  eager  little  heart 
Tired  out  with  play." 

Long  before  Mr.  Hewlett  had  made  trips 
to  Italy,  he  had  sympathetically  studied  the 
great  Italian  poets.  Dante  he  knew  and  loved; 
Pulci,  Poliziano  and  other  Florentines  he  read 
also  in  th,e  original  Italian. 

"A  Masque  of  Dead  Florentines,  wherein 
some  of  Death's  Choicest  Pieces,  and  the 
Great  Game  that  he  played  therewith,  are 
fruitfully  set  forth,"  gives  the  impression  of 
being,  in  verse  of  the  most  epigrammatic  sort, 
the  definite  result  of  these  studies  in  the  Ital- 
ian Renaissance.  It  was  the  poetical  re- 
sult of  it,  just  as  "Earthwork"  and  "Little 
Novels  of  Italy"  were  the  prose.  The  book 
crept  quietly  into  print  in  1895.  It  is  doubtful 
whether  any  big  literary  publication  even 
mentioned  it.  It  is  a  peculiar  work  in  English 
literature.  Mr.  Hewlett  plays  with  the  thought 
of  death.  For  Beddoes,  such  themes  were  an 
obsession;  in  fact  he  was  Death's  veritable 
liegeman.  Mr.  Frank  T.  Marzials,  in  a  unique 
set   of   sonnets   entitled.  "Death's   Disguises," 

27 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

has  pictured  Death  disguised  as  a  courtier,  as 
a  love-god,  as  a  fool,  as  a  harlot,  etc.  Mr. 
Hewlett  treats  of  Death,  as  the  conqueror  of 
all  the  famous  Florentines  who  made  their 
city  what  it  was  in  history,  art  and  song.  He 
makes  the  reader  think  at  times  of  "Every- 
man"and  of  "The  Dance  of  Death."  By  the 
very  nature  of  its  subject  and  treatment,  the 
"Masque"  is  placed  beyond  the  chance  of  pop- 
ularity, presupposing  as  it  does  an  entire 
familiarity  with,  or  at  least  an  interest  in, 
the  great  names  in  Florentine  art,  poetry  and 
statecraft.  Each  of  the  heroes  marches 
through  its  pages,  explaining  the  very  core 
of  his  life  and  aspirations  in  a  quatrain,  as 
worthy  the  term  "epigram"  as  the  somewhat 
famous  early  book  of  them  by  Mr.  William 
Watson.  It  has  been  pointed  out  by  Walter 
Pater  that  the  great  Florentines,  and,  indeed, 
all  the  natives  of  the  famous  city,  were  pre- 
occupied with  the  thought  of  death.  As  proof 
of  this  it  is  only  necessary  to  refer  to  the  ter- 
rible "Pageant  of  Death"  held  in  15 12,  des- 
cribed by  Vasari  at  length. 

It  is  perhaps  not  wrong  to  conjecture  that 
a  knowledge  of  the  details  of  this  famous 
pageant  and  its  song,  coupled  with  a  poet's 

28 


A  MASQUE  OF  DEAD  FLORENTINES 

genuine  insight  into  the  Florentine  heart  and 
mind,  led  Mr.  Hewlett  to  th,e  composition  of 
his  very  original  and  strange  "Masque"  in 
which  the  persons  are  given  as  "a  chorus  of 
tired  ladies  and  poets  forgotten,"  "the  Floren- 
tine Shades,"  "A  Herald,"  "Three  Re- 
proaches" and  "King  Death."  It  is  not  hard 
to  see  from  this  that  it  is  a  macabre  book, 
a  book  that  would  make  the  ordinary  reader 
approach  it  with  a  shudder.  To  this  mixture 
of  masque  and  morality  play,  which  in  a 
measure  tells  of  the  downfall  of  Florence 
from  its  exalted  place,  there  is,  strictly  speak- 
ing, no  action  at  all.  The  chorus  stands  in 
a  ruined  garden  in  winter.  One  by  one  the 
famous  men  and  some  few  women  famed  in 
poetry  and  story,  pass  by,  each  with  a  quat- 
rain on  his  or  her  lips.  These  quatrains  are 
often  taken  up  and  elaborated  by  chorus  as  in 
the  Greek  play..  Chorus  tells  the  story  of 
Dante  and  his  Beatrice,  chimes  in  with  the 
fair  Simonetta,  chants  a  dirge  for  Florence 
fallen.  The  ingenuity  of  the  poet  is  displayed 
by  the  fact  that  each  of  the  quatrains  ends 
either  with  the  word  of  doom,  "dead"  or 
"death,"  and  yet  there  is  no  feeling  of  mon- 
otony, but  only  the  cumulative  and  chilling 

29 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

effect  of  the  sense  of  inevitableness  the  author 
wishes  to  convey. 

The  first  of  the  great  shades  to  pass  is 
that  of  Dante.  It  would  seem  impossible  to 
compress  within  the  narrow  limits  of  a  qua- 
train the  story  of  such  a  great  soul, — yet 
read: 

"The  first  to  speak  in  Florence,  Florence 
spurn'd 

My  song  and  service.  From  home  to  out- 
land  turn'd, 

I  sensed  God's  secrets,  eating  salted  bread. 

God  woke  my  love  by  death;  they  crown'd 
me  dead." 

Chorus  then  takes  up  the  theme  and  here  is 
part  of  its  comment: 

"And  that  great  utterance  he  said 
Liveth,  and  he  who  saw  the  dead 
Cannot  taste  death;  for  Death's  hand  shook 
To  feel  the  burden  of  his  book." 

The  power  and  beauty  of  that  last  sen- 
tence need  little  tribute.  The  true  poet  speaks 
in  the   words.     It  is   one   of  the  most  vivid 

30 


A  MASQUE  OF  DEAD  FLORENTINES 

and  truly  poetical  lines  writen  by  any  of  the 
younger  men.  Here  is  the  secret  of  Petrarch, 
carver  of  lovely  sonnets: 

"My  voice  was  as  th,e  swan's  that  dirgeth 

death ; 
My  joys  were  frail  things,  lighter   than   a 

breath. 
But,    like    the    night,    I    froze    them    to    a 

brede — 
They  wove  me  crowns  thereof,   and  wrapt 

me  dead." 

Of  the  third  of  the  great  Florentine  triad, 
he  writes  in  a  more  romantic  and  passionate 
vein,  as  is  proper  in  dealing  with  the 
great  amorist  and  romancer  of  the  Decam- 
eron: 

"Heavy  the  blossoms,  sultry-sweet  the  wine, 
And  all  the  air  gold-dusted  with  sun-shine. 
I  found  a  girl's  warm  bosom  for  my  head, 
And — God  was  good!  I  lov'd  till  I  was 
dead." 

To  have  done  with  the  poets  and  turn  to 
other  great  names,  here  are  the  sinister  and 

3i 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

sfyuddersome  words  put  into  the  mouth  of  the 
poet  Pulci: 

"Let  who  wins  laugh;  I  laugh'd  at  Heaven 

and  Earth. 
Dante   saw   Grief   and   lov'd   her;     I   chose 

Mirth. 
Mirth   and   I    laugh'd   till  we   were   out   of 

breath, 
And    left    one    laughing    still — th,e    jester, 

Death." 

"Macchiavellian"  has  pased  into  the  lan- 
guage as  a  synonym  for  all  that  is  tricky, 
subterranean,  crafty,  and  mean.  To  few  who 
use  the  word  does  it  occur  that  there  may 
have  been  tragedy  in  tb,e  Italian  statesman's 
life,  and  yet: 

"That   kings   miight   feast    I    sweated    God 

away; 
To    insolent    stripling    feet    I    bow'd    my 

grey 
Wise  brows.     A  smirk,  a  shrug,  a  wagging 

head — 
I  used  this  way;  they  use  it  on  me  dead." 

32 


A  MASQUE  OF  DEAD  FLORENTINES 

"The  Masque"  presents  a  novel  note  in 
latter  day  literature.  It  at  least  does  not 
sedulously  play  the  ape  to  the  work  of  any 
19th  century  giants.  It  shows  an  original  and 
independent  method  of  work;  a  desire  to 
strike  out  into  new  paths,  regardless  of  the 
prevailing  fashion. 

Although  Mr.  Hewlett  once  wrote  in  depre- 
ciative  vein  of  his  earliest  verses,  he  surprised 
his  closest  readers  by  reissuing  many  of  the 
poems  in  "Artemision,"  published  in  April,  1909 
all  the  poems  being  devoted  to  Artemis,  and  a 
note  explaining  that  all  had  been  written  be- 
fore 1898.  The  three  long  idylls,  not  hitherto 
published,  deal  respectively  with  the  story  of 
Callisto,  with  the  sorrows  of  Niobe,  and  with 
Endymion.  They  are  marked,  of  course,  by 
a  familiarity  with  Greek  legend  that  is  to  be 
expected,  and  by  an  ecstasy  of  nature-worship 
that  is  not  so  very  common  in  these  days. 
But  the  idylls  are  not  truly  Greek  as  Keats 
and  Swinburne  and  Arnold  are  in  some  of 
their  work.  There  are  disenchanting  modern- 
isms such  as  "The  Chant  Royal  of  Hymnia's 
praise"  and  the  line  in  which  he  speaks  of  the' 
Niobids'  "Muezzin  call  to  prayer." 

Singularly  enough  a  criticism  of  the  volume 

33 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

stung  him  into  one  of  his  rare  replies  to 
critics.  A  writer  in  the  London  Times,  while 
conceding  him  the  passion,  the  accomplish- 
ment, and  the  command  of  verbal  magic  which 
might  mean  great  poetry,  attacked  his  treat- 
ment of  his  theme,  saying  the  purity  of  his 

Artemis  was  shown,  not  as  a  virtue,  a  force, 
but   as   a  negation;    and   that   his  real   topic 

was  not  the  beauty  of  purity  so  much  as  the 
shamefulness  of  passion.  Part  of  Hewlett's 
reply  is  significant  for  the  light  it  casts  upon 
his  fictional  heroines  as  well  as  for  its  exposi- 
tion of  the  meaning  of  "Artemision: — " 

"The  Greeks  had  two  virgin  goddesses — 
Athena  of  Attica  and  Artemis  of  Arcady.  The 
virginity  of  Athena,  as  I  read  the  myths  in 
Attic  literature,  was  'a  virtue,  a  force'  (to 
quote  your  reviewer) ;  that  of  Artemis  was 
precisely  'a  negation.'  Athena  stood  for  the 
idea  of  deliberate  virginity,  Artemis  for  the 
innate  virginity  of  all  healthy  young  creatures 
— to  my  mind  a  more  beautiful,  if  not  more 
interesting,  conception.  It  is  this,  absolutely 
which  I  have  set  myself  to  exhibit  in  various 
phases.  The  'morals,'  as  your  reviewer  right- 
ly says,  are  neither  here  not  there.  They  are 
mine;    the  goddess  has  need  of  none." 

34 


THE  FOREST  LOVERS. 


MR.  HEWLETT'S  first  novel  appeared 
in  1898.  Up  to  that  time  he  had  written 
few  books  and  these  were  addressed  to 
the  small  and  select  coterie  which  would  read 
aesthetic  appreciations  of  Italian  art  and  life, 
and  the  poetic  excursions  of  a  talented  youth 
filled  with  a  love  for  the  gods  of  Greece  and 
the  exquisite  legends  concerning  them. 
There  was  seemingly  in  Mr.  Hewlett  the 
making  of  a  younger  Pater,  who  would  devote 
his  spare  moments  to  lectures  on  medieval 
topics  and  to  printing  occasional  essays  as 
the  fruit  of  his  studies  upon  such  themes. 
Certainly  one  would  not  have  predicted  that 
the  author  of  "Earthwork"  was  destined  to 
become  one  of  the  great  romanticists  of  the 
day. 

But  granting  his  ambition  to  write  romance, 
there  is  not  much  cause  for  wonder  at  the 
direction  he  chose.  From  boyhood  on  his 
mind  had  been  attracted  toward  certain  kin- 

35 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

dred  writers.  As  a  mere  lad  he  had  adored 
Mallory. 

"The  Forest  Lovers"  is  a  direct  and  belated 
offshoot  of  the  Pre-Raphaelite  school,  which 
itself  was  a  direct  phase  of  the  general  roman- 
tic movement  which  swept  all  over  Europe. 
The  German  and  French  romanticists  had  an 
especial  love  for  Catholicism  and  for  Italy, 
for  medieval  times  and  for  Pre-Raphaelite 
painters  like  Botticelli  and  Ghirlandajo.  Hew- 
lett loved  these  topics  too.  Non-conformist 
and  Huguenot  ancestors  did  not  inspire  Mr. 
Hewlett  with  a  hatred  of  Catholicism.  On 
the  other  hand,  his  attitude  is  one  of  constant 
reverence  and  friendliness.  He  is  temperamen- 
tally and  intellectually  akin  to  the  continental 
members  of  th,e  romantic  school.  But  he  is  also 
in  direct  touch  with  the  English  Pre-Raphael- 
ites,  those  innovators  who  sought  in  their 
creations  to  revive  the  forgotten  world  of  old 
romance,  the  world  of  wonder  and  mystery 
and  spiritual  beauty.  The  keynote  of  the 
work  was  indeed,  what  Theodore  Watts- 
Dunton   called  "The  renascence   of  wonder." 

In  many  ways  William  Morris  was  the 
healthiest  and  best  member  of  this  school. 
He  took  for  his  chief  models  Chaucer,  Mai- 

36 


THE  FOREST  LOVERS 

lory,  and  the  old  French  romances.  Medieval 
art  often  has  a  dreamy  beauty,  something  that 
is  faint  and  shadowy,  and  it  is  this  kind  of 
beauty  that  marks  the  first  medieval  stories 
by  Morris,  contributed  to  the  Oxford  and 
Cambridge  Magazine.  In  these  tales  Morris 
attempts  to  hark  back  to  old  times  and  to  re- 
create the  atmosphere  of  a  dead  era.  The 
stories  are  charming,  but  not  convincing. 
One  doubts  whether  the  characters  in  them 
would  bleed  if  wounded.  The  romance  of 
the  Guenevere  volume  is  more  robust  and 
more  colourful,  deriving  as  it  does  from  the 
old  ballads. 

Now  it  is  precisely  the  work  of  Mallory  and 
of  Morris  that  inspired  Mr.  Hewlett.  The 
youth  who  knew  Mallory  by  heart,  had  his 
attention  directed  to  Morris  by  no  less  a 
critic  than  his  own  father,  who  said  Morris, 
had  "saturated  his  imagination  with  the  glow 
of   chivalric    romance    and    Catholic    mythol- 

ogy." 

The  homesickness  for  the  Middle  Ages  these 
authors  created  in  the  boy  remained  in  the 
man.  He  determined  to  write  a  Pre-Raphael- 
ite romance,  but  one  touched  by  the  humour 
and  the  alertness  of  the   19th  century.     Mr. 

37 


MAURIOE  HEWLETT 

Hewlett  went  back  to  medieval  well-springs 
of  thought  and  emotion,  but  he  cast  aside 
medieval  iteration.  He  placed  his  narrative 
vaguely  in  the  Middle  Ages,  but  he  dropped  a 
certain  childish  naivete  characteristic  of  13th 
century  narratives.  He  used  all  the  old  prop- 
erties of  the  romantic  stage,  but  h,e  told  his 
tale  in  a  spirit  of  fantastic  ideality.  He  used 
a  language  that  smacked  neither  of  the  War- 
dour  street  phase  of  Morris's  career,  nor  of 
that  later  period  when  Morris  was  enamoured 
of  Anglo-Saxon  words  to  the  exclusion  of 
all  oth,ers.  Mr.  Hewlett  took  his  words  from 
many  sources  and  used  a  fragrant  and  ruddy 
English  that  was  a  delight  to  read,  despite  the 
fact  that  at  times  it  verged  upon  the  precious. 
Some  critics  saw  only  the  preciosity. 

In  England  the  reviews  were,  however,  in 
the  main  friendly.  In  fact,  on  January  14, 
1899  "The  Academy"  crowned  the  book  as 
one  of  th,e  three  best  productions  of  the  year 
and  gave  its  author  50  guineas.  The  other 
crowned  books  for  1898  were  Mr.  Sidney 
Lee's  "Life  of  Shakespeare,"  and  Mr.  Joseph 
Conrad's  "Tales  of  Unrest."  In  crowning 
"The  Forest  Lovers,"  the  editor  of  "The 
Academy"  praised  it  especially  for  its  "brave 

38 


THE  FOREST  LOVERS 

front,"  something  not  too  common  in  English 
literature,  although  among  the  moderns,  Bor- 
row, Whitman  and  Stevenson  were  pointed  out 
as  possessing  it. 

The  purchasing  public  liked  the  novel  even 
better  than  the  critics.  The  book  showed  Mr. 
Hewlett  as  a  master  of  the  romantic  form.  Fol- 
lowing his  own  definition,  in  his  consideration 
of  De  Stendhal's  novels,  Mr.  Hewlett  displayed 
a  love  of  adventure,  a  keenness  of  dramatic 
sense,  a  feeling  for  atmosphere,  and  a  rapid- 
ity of  movement  not  surpassed  in  his  day. 
Futhermore  it  was  real  romance,  not  pseudo- 
romance  that  he  gave  his  readers.  This  is 
neither  the  time  nor  the  place  for  /an  ex- 
tended discussion  of  what  is  meant  by  the 
term  "real  romance."  Its  definition  is  one 
th,at  has  troubled  many  writers  about  litera- 
ture and  a  clear-cut  explanation  is  yet  to 
seek.  The  best  is  not  a  definition  at  all.  It 
is  a  comparison,  however,  which  throws  a 
clear  light  upon  the  subject.  It  is  by  the 
late  Mr.  John  Davidson  and  is  as  follows : — 

"Romanticism  bears  somewhat  the  same 
relation  to  romance  that  sentimentality  bears 
to  sentiment." 

In  Mr.  Hewlett's  first  novel  there  is  real  ro- 

39 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

mance,  just  as  there  is  genuine  sentiment  in- 
stead of  namby-pamby  sentimentalism.  "The 
Forest  Lovers,"  despite  its  medieval  tone, 
has  a  theme  which  recommends  it  to  the  suf- 
frages of  modern  readers.  Like  the  pastour- 
elles  of  the  12th  and  13th  centuries,  it  deals 
with  a  certain  sort  of  love.  "The  pastourelles," 
one  writes,  "were  a  special  variety  of  love 
story  of  the  kind  so  curiously  popular  in  all 
medieval  languages,  and  so  curiously  alien 
from  modern  experience,  where  a  passing 
knight  sees  a  damsel  of  low  degree,  and 
woos  her  at  once,  with  or  without  success." 
It  is  to  be  added  that  there  was  a  develop- 
ment of  the  theme  in  which,  the  maiden  proved 
to  be  not  low,  but  of  high  degree,  as,  for  in- 
stance, in  that  masterpiece  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
the  lovely  "Aucassin  and  Nicolete."  "The 
Forest  Lovers,"  is  a  prose  pastourelle,  if  the 
term  may  be  allowed. 

It  struck  a  fresh  note  at  the  time  it  ap- 
peared. People  had  become  accustomed  to 
the  minute  realism  of  Hardy,  to  the  dazzle 
of  Meredith,  to  the  strangeness  of  Kipling's 
India,  to  the  humble  human  comedy  of  Bar- 
rie's  Thrums,  to  the  toy  kingdoms  of  Hope. 

Th,e  public  was  ready  for  a  story  of  pure 

40 


THE  FOREST  LOVERS 

romance,  laid  in  that  no  man's  land  of  dreams 
which  is  sometimes  the  most  real  of  all  lands. 
The  author  did  not  try  to  deceive  his  readers. 
On  the  very  first  page  of  his  book  he  set  forth 
in  brief  just  what  he  proposed  to  tell: 

"My  story  will  take  you  into  times  and 
spaces  alike  rude  and  uncivil.  Blood  will 
be  spilled,  virgins  suffer  distresses;  the  horn 
will  sound  through  woodland  glades ;  dogs, 
wolves,  deer  and  men,  Beauty  and  the  Beasts 
will  tumble  each  other,  seeking  life  or  death 
with  their  proper  tools.  There  should  be  mad 
work,  not  devoid  of  entertainment." 

The  promise  here  made  is  well  kept.  It  is 
a  Forest  of  Arden  book.  There  are  hints  of 
New  Forest,  but  there  is  more  of  Morte 
D'Artur  in  it  and  something  besides  of  Mr. 
Hewlett's  own.  The  book  is  brave  with  the 
sunlight  of  the  open  lawny  spaces,  sweet  with 
the  fragrant  breezes  of  the  forest's  green 
alleys.  It  is  a  story  of  love,  of  love  over- 
whelming. At  first  it  almost  seems  it  is  going 
to  exemplify  an  Ibsen  saying:  "To  love,  to 
sacrifice  all  and  to  be  forgotten — that  is 
women's  saga." 

Isoult,  the  heroine,  is  the  kind  of  woman  of 
whom  such  a  saying  is  true.     But  she  inspires 

4i 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

a  love  that  will  not  forget  and  will  not  rest — 
and  that  makes  the  story.  The  tale  is  far 
from  being  a  perfect  one.  It  is  full  of  the 
kind  of  weakness  a  first  novel  is  apt  to  have. 
Its  chapter  on  Spiridion  reads  as  if  it  might 
have  been  written  by  some  pale  German  ro- 
manticist. Its  characters  often  do  things 
that  can  only  be  accounted  for  on  the  theory 
that  if  they  had  acted  otherwise  the  story 
would  have  come  to  an  untimely  end  early 
in  the  chapter.  But  the  crudest  thing  in  the 
book,  a  crudity  of  which  Mr.  Hewlett  was 
never  again  guilty,  was  the  mingled  symbol- 
ism and  coincidence  in  a  series  of  happen- 
ings. 

But  enough  of  the  disagreeable  if  necessary 
and  thankless  work  of  the  advocatus  diaboli. 
Perhaps  the  more  sensible  way  to  treat  of 
the  book  would  be  to  consider:  Taken  as  a 
whole  does  it  charm;  does  it  carry  one  along 
breathlessly  from  incident  to  incident  unto 
th,e  happy  end?  The  answer  is,  of  course,  in 
the  affirmative.  The  book  does  charm  with 
a  score  of  graces.  It  has  the  grace  of  style. 
It  has  the  lovely  grace  of  youth.  Indomitable 
youth  sings  in  every  line  of  it.  It  has  the 
grace  of  the  poet  who  loves  nature,  who  joys 

4* 


THE  FOREST  LOVERS 

in  the  changing  spells  the  forest  casts,  who 
loves  Love  and  all  his  almoners  .  It  has  th,e 
grace  of  humour  and  fun,  which,  is  very  un- 
Morrisian,  to  coin  an  uncouth  phrase. 

It  has  the  charm  of  introducing  the  second  in 
Mr.  Hewlett's  wonderful  gallery  of  women, — 
Isoult,  a  woman  almost  all  flesh  and  blood, 
although  living  in  the  arras  world  of  faery. 

This  is  because  the  work  is  more  than  th,e 
clever  "fake,"  which  the  author  himself  once 
lightly  pronounced  it.  There  is  something 
more  in  it  than  a  fairy  story  of  a  Mallory 
world.  Red  blood  flows  in  the  veins  of  some 
of  its  characters.  Real  emotions  are  felt. 
Real  moral  battles  are  fought  and  won.  It 
is  a  story  of  a  knight  who  rescues  and  weds  a 
maid  in  distress.  Various  villains  pursue  her, 
this  one  for  lust,  that  one  for  fortune.  The 
beggar  maid  is  revealed  as  a  princess  in  her 
own  right.  The  significant  figures  are  Pros- 
per and  Isoult  la  Desirous,  who  was  de- 
sirous of  the  love  of  the  man  who  wedded  her 
to  save  her  from  villains.  Brandes  says  of 
certain  German  authors :  "the  love  of  the  Ro- 
manticists is  a  refined  and  chastened  love,  'the 
art  of  love.' "  There  is  no  such  love  in  Pros- 
pers   case.      There    is    no    love    at    all    at 

43 


MAURIOE  HEWLETT 

first.  There  is  simply  lust  of  the  eye.  He  is 
chastened  by  longing.  He  is  taught  by  ex- 
perience. Only  gradually  does  he  learn  that 
woman's  love  means  to  love  a  man  and  be 
silent;  to  serve  him  gladly;  to  suffer  for  him, 
if  need  be,  die  for  him,  but  always  in  all 
sweetness  of  spirit  and  holiness  of  soul.  It 
is  the  necessity  for  the  lesson  the  hero  must 
learn  that  gives  Mr.  Hewlett  the  opportunity 
for  a  fine  scene  between  Prosper  and  her  who 
has  been  his  wife  in  name  only,  a  scene  in 
which  she  shows  him  to  himself,  as  one  not 
loving  but  lustful,  not  claiming  her  as  wife  but 
with  hot  desire  as  for  a  leman. 

The  woman  is  thus  shown  to  have  the 
deeper  character.  Prosper  is  merely  a  light- 
hearted,  thoughtless,  healthy  young  animal, 
who  loves  beauty,  who  loves  a  fight,  who 
loves  mastery.  But  Isoult  is  more  complex. 
Well  born,  she  remembers  nothing  but  a  life 
of  sordid  misery  and  privation.  Virginal  in 
heart  and  soul,  she  has  been  harried  all  her 
young  life,  because  of  the  fatal  gift  of  beauty, 
a  curse  rather  than  a  blessing  in  a  world  of 
medieval  manners  and  men.  She  is  lovely 
even  in  her  rags.  She  is  breeched  as  a  boy,  a 
minor    Rosalind,   whose   two   chief   words   in 

44 


THE  FOREST  LOVERS 

connection  with  her  lord  are  "love"  and 
"serve."  She  endures  beatings  at  the  hands 
of  charcoal-burners  rather  than  reveal  her 
sex;  nameless  outrages  at  the  hands  of  a 
heartless  mob  rather  than  reveal  the  real  re- 
lation between  herself  and  Prosper.  She  is 
faithful  in  all  ways;  ready  to  be  faithful  unto 
death.  She  is  Mr.  Hewlett's  medieval  woman, 
lovely  and  loving  and  meek.  And  after  all 
she  is  simply  a  child,  her  heart  unchilled  and 
her  mind  untainted  by  the  evil  sh,e  has  read 
in  men's  eyes  and  the  foulness  she  has  heard 
from  men's  mouths. 

The  success  of  "The  Forest  Lovers,"  did 
more  than  determine  the  career  of  Mr.  Hew- 
lett. It  was  directly  responsible  for  a  school 
of  card-board  medieval  fiction  whose  chief 
exponents  are  still  busy  writing  tales  to  fit 
coloured  plates  in  the  magazines.  But  these 
stories  are  lacking  in  the  qualities  that  won 
for  Mr.  Hewlett.  In  "The  Forest  Lovers," 
despite  all  crudities  and  mannerisms,  the  sun- 
light that  shines  down  the  dappled  ways  has 
real  warmth;  the  breeze  has  real  strength; 
beneath  the  bodices  of  rich  cloth  and  the  suits 
of  durable  armour,  hearts  beat  that  are  stirred 
by  real  love  and  real  hate. 

45 


PAN  AND  THE  YOUNG  SHEPHERD. 


PAN  and  the  Young  Shepherd"  is  one 
of  the  finest  things  Mr.  Hewlett  has 
done.  When  the  chapter  on  his  work 
is  finally  closed  and  the  last  assay  made,  this 
will  not  be  counted  among  the  least  of  his 
achievements. 

Th,e  works  on  poetics  say  that  pastoral 
drama  is  a  thing  done  best  in  Elizabethan  and 
Jacobean  times.  The  student  is  referred  to  Jon- 
son  and  Fletcher  and  is  told  that  this  sort  of 
thing  is  not  written  in  modern  days.  He  is 
even  informed  that  eclogues  and  idylls,  after 
the  Theocritean  manner,  are  outmoded. 
People  no  longer  pretend  to  believe  in  shep- 
herds who  discourse  wisely  and  sweetly  of 
life  and  love  and  death;  who  play  the  oaten 
pipe  under  spreading  trees,  while  they  dream 
of  the  great  elemental  things  of  this  world. 

Shepherds  call  to  mind  their  patron  god, 
the  great  god  Pan,  and  readers  are  told  in 
melodious  verse  that  Pan  is   dead,   that  the 

46 


PAN  AND  THE  YOUNG  SHEPHERD 

Christian  era  killed  him,  just  as  it  sent  Apollo 
to  slave  in  Picardy,  and  drove  other  gods 
into  exile. 

Of  all  said  regarding  the  writing  of  pastoral 
drama  in  this  modern  day,  this  passage  is 
the  truest: 

"It  must  be  realistic  to  a  certain  degree 

Then  it  must  be  romantic,  too,  with,  the  ro- 
mance of  nature,  with  that  feeling  for  the 
strangeness  and  mystery  of  the  deep  woods 
and  open  uplands  that  is  one  of  the  notes  of 
the  poetry  of  this  century.  Then,  probably  it 
must  be  idealistic,  in  that  each,  figure  and 
character  must  be  surcharged  with  the  feeling 
and  atmosphere  of  some  mood  or  tendency 
in  thought;  for  that  is  something  we  cannot 
escape  now.  And  it  should  also  be  classic; 
for  th,e  pastoral  is  a  traditional  form;  it  re- 
minds us  of  the  best  periods  of  our  literature. 
It  is  a  form  moulded  by  the  touch  of  masters 
who  are  classic." 

The  writer  of  this  definition  frankly  says  it 
is  not  an  a  priori  formula,  but  one  deduced 
from  a  perusal  of  "Pan."  It  is  something  to 
have  done  so  well  as  to  supply  an  acute 
critic  with  the  material  for  a  new  formula. 
And  how  well  Mr.  Hewlett  illustrates  it!    He 

47 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

is  realistic  in  his  rustics,  idealistic  in  his  lov- 
ers, romantic  in  his  worship  of  nature,  classic 
in  his  following  of  models  hallowed  by  time, 
and  the  best  judgment  of  the  ablest  critics, 
Yes,  the  pastoral  is  possible  today, — when  a 
Hewlett  writes  it. 

He  has  worked  in  prose,  on  the  whole, 
where  the  classic  authors  worked  in  poetry,  al- 
though, of  course  Mr.  Hewlett's  method  is  that 
of  the  poet.  For  the  nonce,  he  has  believed 
in  Pan.  It  is  almost  as  if  Robert  Louis  Steven- 
son had  foreseen  the  condition  under  which  a 
modern  man  would  produce  a  Pan  Play: 

"The  Greeks  figured  Pan,  the  god  of  Nature, 
now  terriblly  stamping  his  foot,  so  th,at 
armies  were  dispersed;  now  by  the  woodside 
on  a  summer  noon  trolling  on  his  pipe  until 
he  charmed  the  hearts  of  the  upland  plough- 
men. And  the  Greeks,  in  so  figuring,  uttered 
the  last  word  of  human  experience.  To  cer- 
tain smoke-dried  spirits  matter  and  motion 
and  elastic  ethers,,  and  the  hypothesis  of  this 
and  that  spectacled  professor,  tell  a  speaking 
story;  but  for  youth  and  all  ductile  and  con- 
genial minds,  Pan  is  not  dead,  but  of  all  the 
classic  hierarchy  alone  survives  in  triumph; 
goat-footed    with    a    gleeful    and   angry  look, 

48 


PAN  AND  THE  YOUNG  SHEPHERD 

the  type  of  the  shaggy  world;  and  in  every 
wood,  if  you  go  with  a  spirit  properly  pre- 
pared, you  shall  hear  the  note  of  his  pipe." 

It  is  exactly  in  this  ductile  and  congenial 
mood  of  youth,  that  Mr.  Hewlett  entered  that 
fancy-land : — 

"Scene,  pastoral  country:  Champney  Val- 
tort  in  Pascency,  and  the  hills  about  it.  Time, 
what  you  will." 

Here  in  this  land  dwell  peasants,  pagan  at 
heart  and  with  a  thin  veneer  of  Christianity; 
here  dwells  Neanias,  with  an  unearthly  strain 
in  his  blood;  here  Pan  is  at  his  eternal  play, 
the  laughing  god  to  those  who  yield  to  him, 
the  angry  immortal  to  those  who  seek  to 
thwart  his  will. 

Take  Jonson's  exquisite  fragment  of  "The 
Sad  Shepherd"  as  an  exemplar  for  compar- 
ison's sake  and  see  how  faithfully  Mr.  Hew- 
lett has  followed  classic  models.  He  makes 
his  shepherd  boy,  Neanias,  discourse  in  prose 
that  is  touched  by  the  fire  of  poetry.  Jonson's 
sad  shepherd,  Aeglamour,  speaks  in  divine 
verse  such  as  no  peasant  ever  uttered  save  in 
the  pages  of  the  masters. 

Jonson  did  not  shrink  from  injecting  humour 
into  his  pastoral,  declaring  in  his  prologue: 

49 


MAURICfE  HEWLETT 

"But  fere's  an  heresy  of  late  let  fall, 
That  mirth  by  no  means  fits  a  pastoral." 

Even  as  Jonson  did  not  hesitate,  so,  too  the 
modern  poet  has  used  humour,  racy  of  the 
soil,  to  enliven  his  little  play.  And  finally, 
just  as  Jonson  introduced  supernatural  beings 
in  the  shape  of  Robin  Goodfellow  and  his 
mistress,  the  witch,  so  in  the  later  production, 
there  are  Pan  and  the  seven  daughters  of 
earth. 

Despite  this  following  of  classic  models, 
despite  the  odd  snatches  of  verse  with  which 
each,  act  is  prefaced,  despite  the  old  English 
which  is  sometimes  spoken,  and  the  atmos- 
phere of  old  time  which  is  conveyed,  the  poet 
remains  a  modern,  too.  He  can  not  escape 
his  age  entirely.  He  is  filled  with  the  modern 
love  of  nature,  in  addition  to  a  pagan  wor- 
ship of  nature-forces,  amounting  to  pantheism 
He  is  alive  also  to  the  modern  tendencies,  to  a 
symbolism  which  is  not  often  easily  ex- 
pounded; which  is  felt,  but  not  explainable. 
Whether  he  would  or  no,  in  "Pan"  Mr.  Hew- 
lett is  brother  to  Maeterlinck  of  the  early 
plays  and  William  Sharp  of  the  "Vistas." 

One  expounder  called  this  pastoral  merely 

50 


PAN  AND  THE  YOUNG  SHEPHERD 

a  weaker  "Forest  Lovers."  Another  said  the 
peasants  were  peasants  of  today  labeled  with 
Greek  names,,  while  still  another  said  they  be- 
longed to  the  Middle  Ages.  This  much,  is 
true: — the  poet  created  his  own  country,  even 
as  he  did  in  "The  Forest  Lovers,"  although 
the  Derbyshire  Peak  and  the  Cheviot  Hills 
gave  him  some  hint  as  to  his  locale.  When 
it  comes  to  the  time,  there  is  doubt ,  al- 
though terms  like  "reeve,"  "pinder,"  "mul- 
ture," "theaves,"  and  "hogget"  point  to  a 
provincial  England  of  Chaucer's  day. 

The  story  of  the  little  play  is  simple. 
Neanias,  a  shepherd  lad,  after  discoursing  with 
his  grandfather,  Geron,  driven  on  by  a  rest- 
less heritage  in  his  blood,  (the  gift  of  his 
mother  about  whom  the  glamour  of  mystery 
is  thrown,  even  as  Ibsen  throws  it  about  El- 
lida,  "The  Lady  from  the  Sea"),  goes  to  seek 
the  "sisters  of  the  Tarn,"  the  seven  earth 
spirits,  of  whom  six  have  yielded  to  Pan,  while 
the  seventh,  Aglae,  Virgin  Dawn,  has  been 
stricken  cold  and  dumb  by  the  angry  god. 
The  six  sisters,  who  have  their  powers  of 
speech,  seek  to  beguile  Neanias,  but  in  vain. 
He  takes  Aglae  by  the  hand,  wins  her  for 
bride,  and  takes  her  home  with  him.     In  the 

5i 


MAURIOE  HEWLETT 

next  act,  the  poet  shpws  Aglae  still  dumb, 
but  broken  to  domestic  ways,  serving  Neanias, 
the  while  he  is  more  in  love  with  her  than 
ever.  Pan  sends  a  great  storm,  and  Aglae, 
drawn  against  her  will,  leaves  the  hut  and 
goes  into  th,e  night,  while  the  peasantry  are 
guarding  their  sheep.  But  she  does  not 
leave  before  Merla — in  love  with  Neanias — 
has  given  her  hard  words.  Neanias  seeks  his 
lost  wife,  only  to  be  jeered  at  by  the  six  sis- 
ter who  proclaim  th,e  awful  might  of  Pan, 
who  greatly  angered  strikes  down  both  Ne- 
anias and  his  loved  one.  Merla,  quite  con- 
science-stricken, meets  Pan,  who  is  attracted 
by  the  healthy  beauty  of  the  wench.  Sh,e 
pleads  for  Neanias  and  his  Aglae  and  agrees 
to  give  herself  to  Pan — but  in  marriage — a 
piquant  and  daring  touch.  The  play  ends  with 
Aglae  restored  to  speech  and  gladly  listening 
while  h,er  husband  intones  an  Epiphany  song. 
This  outline  may  convey  an  idea  of  the  scope 
of  "Pan."  There  are  three  kinds  of  characters 
in  it, — the  peasants,  with  their  shrewd,  hard- 
won  wisdom ;  Neanias,  the  lover  made  bold  by 
his  love;  and  the  earth-spirits  expressing 
themselves  in  song. 

The   chief   of   these   rustics   is   Geron,   the 

52 


PAN  AND  THE  YOUNG  SHEPHERD 

grandfather  of  Neanias.  He  is  a  real  shep- 
herd with,  the  smell  and  the  colour  of  the  soil 
upon  him;  with  his  love  of  sheep,  his  wise 
saws  about  the  weather,  his  racy  views  about 
life,  his  odd  cronies. 

His  speech  is  authentic.  His  autobiogra- 
phy in  little  rings  true.  It  is  the  shepherd  to 
the  life. 

Now,  in  writing,  a  literary  man  who  de- 
sires to  create  clowns  has  two  kinds  of  mod- 
els before  him.  There  are  Shakespeare's  won- 
derful clowns,  in  a  class  all  by  themselves, 
not  mere  rustic  witlings,  but  sublimated  fools, 
if  the  term  may  be  allowed.  They  are  of  no 
time  and  place,  but  as  universal  as  humanity, 
as  independent  of  time  as  the  deathless  plays 
in  which  they  laugh,  and  hum  their  quaint 
old  tunes.  Then  there  is  the  clown  peculiar 
to  one  particular  region,  the  rustic  of  Hardy's 
beloved  Wessex,  for  instance.  Since  Pas- 
cency  is  anywhere  and  the  time  in  which  they 
lived  is  "what  you  will,"  Mr.  Hewlett  had 
to  make  his  clowns  representative  of  the  class 
rather  than  typical  of  any  particular  region. 
He  has  chosen  to  learn  from  the  unapproach- 
able bard,  rather  than  from  the  contemporary 
novelist.     Th,ere  is  a  homely  wit  and  wisdom 

53 


MAURiqE  HEWLETT 

in  these  Pascency  rustics  which,  with  some 
few  changes,  might  be  found  in  ignorant  men 
of  the  soil  anywhere.  Their  simple  old  jokes, 
their  homely  similes,  their  quaint  old  rhymes 
have  the  rich  savour  of  real  life.  Hear  them  at 
their  wit-combats,  when  they  are  slightly 
tipsy : 

Mopsus : 

"Life  goes  to  a  tune  according  as  a  man  is 
tuneful,  hath,  music.  Not  otherwise  by  no 
means.  Sphorx,  now,  should  be  ripe  wi'  tunes 
like  an  old  organ. 

Sphorx  (leaning  back)  : 

"My  soul  is  as  it  were  a  windy  bag;  you 
must  jog  me  ere  I  sing.    I  should  be  squeezed." 

Geron : 

"I  could  a'  squeezed  ye  ten  year  back." 

Teucer: 

"I  can  pinch  ye,  Sphorx,  if  it  is  only  a  mat- 
ter of  a  nip  here  and  there.  Lords!  What 
a  knotty  thigh,.  Sphorx,  thou'rt  a  seasonable 
vessel." 

Sphorx : 

"Alack,  no  vessel  am  I,(  but  an  humble  in- 
strument, friends,  of  the  Lord's  making,  the 
Lord's  making.  Well!  I  will  sing  ye  a  stave 
of  an  old  antient  tune,  perhaps  ye  know  it. 

54 


PAN  AND  THE  YOUNG  SHEPHERD 

'Tis  all  of  a  man  and — " 

Geron : 

"And  a  woman,  for  a  thousand  pound!" 

Sphorx : 

"There  is  mention  of  a  female,  and  of  cider, 
and  of  sheep,  and  of  a  man's  wife  or  wives." 

Neanias  is  different  from  these  men.  If 
he  has  any  of  tus  grandfather's  blood  in  his 
veins,  he  hardly  shows  it.  The  passionate, 
poetic  brain  of  the  sea-woman,  his  mother,  is 
his  also.  Throughout,  he  is  contrasted  with 
old  Geron.  The  poetry  of  the  one  is  set  off 
against  the  homely  prose  of  the  other;  the 
otherworldliness  of  the  younger  clash.es  with 
the  homely  wisdom  of  the  seasoned  "antient;" 
the  dreamer  is  pitted  against  the  man  of  prac- 
tical, if  small,  affairs.  Neanias  is  a  poet,  filled 
with  the  love  of  forests  and  of  all  nature,  a 
poet  who  is  blind  to  material  things,  who  goes 
questing  for  th,e  girl  of  his  dream. 

To  come  now  to  Mr.  Hewlett's  mythus. 
He  has  created  seven  new  goddesses,  or  rather 
earth  spirits.  It  is  easy  to  understand  the 
legend  in  part.  Pan  is,  of  course,  the  great 
fructifier,  the  great  underlying  and  stimulat- 
ing principle  of  nature,  making  fruitful  these 
daughters  of  earth.     But  consider  Aglae  and 

55 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

seek  to  analyze  farther  and  more  explicitly 
and  the  student  becomes  quite  as  befogged, 
as  did  those  who  attempted  to  write  out  in 
plain  words  what  the  symbolists  of  France 
and  Belgium  meant.  It  is  best  to  fall  back  on 
Mr.  Hewlett  himself.  He  will  give  as  distinct 
a  key  as  may  be  needed: 

"  'Pan  and  the  Young  Shepherd'  is  difficult 
to  account  for.  I  was  steeped  in  poetry  just 
then  and  had  been  reading  an  enormous 
amount  of  Platonism,  Greek  mythology  and 
pantheistic  stuff.  There's  a  deal  of  pantheism 
tucked  away  in  it  and  some  good  mythology. 
The  whole  thing  is  really  a  myth.  The  root 
idea.  I  suppose  is  the  oneness  of  creation — man 
as  a  natural  force,  differing  in  no  essential  way 
from  Plants  and  Animals.  Then  God  is  re- 
duced to  the  same  expression  and  He  and 
Man,  and  the  Wind  and  Weather,  Trees, 
Sheep,  Love,  Life,  Death,  Fear,  all  play  their 
parts  out  and  meet  and  merge  and  mate  and 
mingle.  I  believe  it's  more  or  less  true,  even 
now.  Personally,  I  think  'Pan'  the  nearest 
I  have  ever  come  to  poetry.  It's  the  only  sort 
of  poetry  I  can  do." 

Mr.  Hewlett  has  created  new  characters  in 
mythology  and  has  allowed  them  to  describe 

56 


PAN  AND  THE  YOUNG  SHEPHERD 

themselves  very  graphically..  Sitys  says: 
"My  laughing  is  lighter  than  the  leap  of  a 
squirrel,  and  brighter  than  the  sun  on  the 
yellow  leaves.  I  love  good  cheer  and  warm 
woods:  I  am  very  kind.  I  suckle  the  young 
fauns  that  I  bear  to  my  lord  the  goat-shankt. 
I  am  Bonny  Beech  Mast."  Dryas  says:  "I  am 
Dryas,  Crown  &  The  Oak,  youngest  but  one 
of  th,e  seven  Sisters.  I  am  too  wild  to  be  fos- 
ter-mother of  fauns.  I  love  all,  but  choose 
none.  Chiefest  I  love  the  Sun,  and  the  Sun 
me.    If  I  have  a  master  it  is  the  Sun." 

The  songs  by  th,e  sisters,  might  be  defined 
as  Mr.  Hewlett's  plus  something  echoed  from 
Shelley,  as  when  Adora  sings : 

"I  am  the  Morning  Calm  and  the  smile  of 
me  is  like  sleep 

Even  and  deep; 

And  my  eyes  are  twin-mountain  lakes,  and 
the  lashes  of  them 

Like  the  swishing  sedge 

That  hideth  the  water's  edge. 

I  float  on  the  white  water  ere  daylight  be- 
gins 

Or  the  moon  grows  wan, 

And  I  spin  at  a  loom  the  life  of  the  day  to 
come, 

57 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

A  little  span, 

The  day  of  the  life  of  man." 

The  poet  in  Mr.  Hewlett  may  have  fallen 
short  of  his  aspirations,  the  artist  may  not 
be  entirely  satisfied  with  his  work — what  true 
artist  ever  is  or  can  be  ? — but  it  will  be  agreed 
that  "Pan"  was  well  worth  writing.  It  stands 
out  amid  the  ruck  of  easy  verse  by  dint  of  the 
riches  with  which  it  is  filled. 


58 


LITTLE  NOVELS  OF  ITALY. 


MARCEL  SCHWOB,  trying  to  depict 
the  manners  and  feelings  of  an  age 
long  dead,  invented  for  himself,  or 
perhaps  perfected  is  the  discreeter  phrase,  a 
method  of  doing  so  by  painting  miniatures, — 
giving  brief,  vivid  glimpses  into  the  life  of 
by-gone  days. 

This  is  at  its  best  in  "Mimes,"  and  "The 
Children's  Crusade,"  especially  in  the  former. 
A  page  or  two  suffices  to  set  forth  some 
phase  of  the  thought  of  some  one  personage 
in  the  faraway  ancient  Greece  of  the  classical 
era. 

Small  in  itself  though  it  be,  each  miniature 
is  revelatory  of  the  painter's  great  learning. 
It  shows  how  much  he  has  read  and  dreamed 
of  Greece;  how  much  he  has  comprehended 
by  intuition  and  by  taking  thought. 

Similarly  in  his  "Little  Novels  of  Italy"  Mr. 
Hewlett  has  depicted  the  life  of  Renaissance 
Italy   after   a   method   of   his   own.      He   has 

59 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

painted  five  panel  pictures^  brilliant  with 
colour,  dazzling,  struck  off  at  a  white  heat, 
glowing  with  the  energy  and  poetry  of  youth. 
Schwob's  "Mimes"  have  always  a  greyness 
about  th,em  as  of  faded  antiques,  toned  by 
time.  And  this  is  proper.  Mr.  Hewlett's 
panels  are  brilliant  with  reds  and  greens  and 
golds.     And  this,  too,  is  proper. 

Always  remembering  that  the  subjects  are 
taken  from  Renaissance  times,  his  panels 
might  have  been  labeled  respectively,  "Ve- 
rona," "Padua/'  "Nona,"  "Pistoja"  and  "Fer- 
rara."  Or,  dropping  for  the  moment  his  own 
titles  and  attempting  to  condense  in  a  phrase 
the  inner  meaning  of  each,,  they  could  have 
been  labeled:  "A  legend  of  Madonna;  "Love 
of  the  Precieuses ;"  "Love  of  the  condottieri ;" 
"Love  of  a  Renaissance  poet;"  and  finally  and 
simply  "Love's  Comedy." 

Almost  all  of  Renaissance  Italy  is  touched 
upon  in  some  of  its  phases  in  these  five  de- 
lightful productions.  If  love  is  the  main 
theme,  it  is  proper,  "for  love  in  loved-learned 
Tuscany  was  then  a  roaring  wind;  it  came 
rhythmically  and  set  the  glowing  mass  beat- 
ing like  the  sestet  of  a  sonnet.  One  lived  in 
numbers  in  those  days ;  numbers  always  came. 

60 


LITTLE  NOVELS  OF  ITALY 

You  sonnetteered  upon  the  battle-field,  in 
the  pulpit,  on  the  bench,  at  the  bar." 

And  there  are  all  sorts  and  conditions  of 
Renaissance  men  in  love, — princes  of  degree, 
captains  of  old  wars,  poets  of  fame,  poetic 
fops,  seasoned  condottieri,  pages,  secretaries 
and  shepherds. 

Thinking  of  these  things,  one  critic  com- 
pared th,e  stories  not  to  painting,  but  "to  a 
set  of  musical  pieces  in  which  the  only  marks 
of  expression  are  'amoroso'  and  'con  dol- 
cezza.'  " 

Literature  as  well  as  life  has  always  in- 
spired Mr.  Hewlett.  The  reader  naturally, 
therefore,  wonders  what  relation  these  little 
novels  bear  to  the  old  Italian  novelle. 

The  latter  were  the  instruments  in  which 
the  keynote  of  the  Renaissance  was  struck. 
Very  probably  then  if  Mr.  Hewlett's  tales  re- 
semble the  novelle,  they  serve  as  the  medium 
in  which  he  has  conveyed  the  best  of  what  he 
knows  and  feels  about  Italy  of  the  Renais- 
sance. 

The  novelle,  Symonds  says,  is  a  narrative, 
but  invariably  brief  and  sketchy.  "It  does 
not  aim  at  presenting  a  detailed  picture  of 
human  life   within   certain   artificially   chosen 

61 


MAURICfE  HEWLETT 

limitations,  but  confines  itself  to  a  striking 
situation,  or  tells  an  anecdote  illustrative  of 
some  moral  quality." 

"The  narrator  went  straight  to  h,is  object, 
which  was  to  arrest  attention,  stimulate  the 
curiosity,  gratify  the  sensual  instincts,  excite 
the  laughter,  or  stir  the  tender  emotions  of  his 
audience  by  some  fantastic,  extraordinary, 
voluptuous,  comic  or  pathetic  incident.  He 
sketched  his  personages  with  a  few  swift 
touches,  set  forth  their  circumstances  with 
pungent  brevity,  and  expended  his  force  upon 
the  painting  of  the  central  motive." 

And  Symonds  adds  that  entertainment  was 
clearly  their  one  great  object.  This  quotation 
makes  clear  how  closely  these  "Little  Novels" 
approach,  to  the  Renaissance  novelle.  They, 
too,  go  straight  to  their  one  central  theme; 
th,ey,  too,  sketch  their  personages  briefly  and 
vividly  and  they,  too^  march  rapidly  forward 
in  narrative.  They,  too,  are  by  turns  fantastic, 
extraordinary,  voluptuous,  comic,  and  pathetic. 
There  is  even  occasionally  a  tragic  note. 

Conforming  thus  very  closely  to  the  defini- 
tion of  an  old  style,  they  conform  likewise  to 
a  modern.  It  has  been  said  that  the  modern 
short  story  is  either  an  anecdote  or  a  picture. 

62 


LITTLE  NOVELS  OF  ITALY 

In  the  hands  of  a  master  it  may  be  both,. 
Mr.  Hewlett's  "Little  Novels"  are  both  an- 
ecdotes and  pictures.  Each  presents  a  distinct 
picture  of  a  city  of  the  Renaissance  time. 
Each  conceivably  could  have  started  from 
some  anecdote  or  legend  to  be  gathered  from 
the  letters,  histories  and  memoirs  of  the 
period.  Th.e  criticism  has  been  made  that 
these  stories  are  purely  objective;  that  the 
author  stimulates,  but  does  not  satisfy;  that 
he  narrates,  but  does  not  prove;  that  he  needs 
to  toil  for  a  deeper  vision  of  the  human  heart 
and  a  greater  power  of  convincement. 

Remember  that  these  are  novelle  and  it 
will  be  seen  that  such  sayings  are  hypercriti- 
cal. To  demand  what  he  does  not  pretend  nor 
wish  to  give,  is  as  if  one  censured  a  comedian 
for  not  being  tragic.  Mr.  Hewlett  had  a 
definite  object  in  view,  a  definite  plan  that  he 
carried  out.  These  stories  present  ob- 
jectively a  vision  of  Italy.  They  illuminate 
and  explain  an  era.  They  are  not  phychologi- 
cal  and  do  not  pretend  to  be.  Within  the 
limits  set  for  them,  they  are  among  the  best 
examples  of  story-writing  of  the  past  three 
or  four  decades.  They  do  for  Italy  what 
Stevenson's  two  famous  short  stories  did  for 

63 


MAURIOE  HEWLETT 

medieval  Paris.  They  fix  his  fame  as  a  short 
story  writer.  So  unemotional  and  seasoned 
a  critic  as  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  has  said:  "I 
h,old  'The  Madonna  of  the  Peach  Tree'  to  be 
as  perfect  a  short  story  as  we  have  had  in  our 
time.  It  has  humour,  poetry,  pathos,  mystery, 
imaginative  history,  and  pure  humanity." 

There  should  be  coupled  with  thjs  story, 
thus  acclaimed,  "The  Judgment  of  Borso,"  so 
various  in  its  charm  and  fun,  so  dainty,  so 
daring  a  piece  of  typical  Hewlett  high  comedy 
when  Mr.  Hewlett  is  at  his  best. 

Part  of  their  charm  is  that  these  stories 
break  away  from  the  somewhat  traditional 
Italy.  George  Brandes  points  out  that  the 
Italy  of  literature  is  a  country  which  never 
existed  on  any  map  save  of  the  roman- 
ticists. The  real  Italy  of  bright  colours  and 
cheerful  life,  he  says,  is  not  to  be  found  in  their 
pages.  To  the  romanticists  Italy  became  what 
Dulcinea  was  to  Don  Quixote,  an  ideal  of 
which  they  knew  almost  nothing  beyond  what 
was  conveyed  by  a  few  general  and  descrip- 
tive phrases.  They  loved  Italy  as  a  ruin, 
Catholicism  as  a  mummy.  This  is  not  so  with 
Mr.  Hewlett.  He  gives  an  Italy  that  is  alive, 
pulsating  with  the  fierceness  of  life;  pictures 

64 


LITTLE  NOVELS  OF  ITALY 

a  Catholicism  very  human  and  very  close  to 
the  hearts  and  lives  of  th,e  common  people. 
His  Italy  does  exist  on  the  map. 

Each  of  the  five  tales  here  grouped  together 
has  a  certain  similarity  beyond  that  of  time 
and  place.  Each  deals  with  the  problems  that 
confront  a  clean-hearted  and  simple-minded 
girl  set  amid  the  whirl  of  a  life  that  is  fantas- 
tic or  frivolous,  or  evil.  They  are  simple  fools 
made  for  loving;  tall  girls — Mr.  Hewlett  likes 
them  tall — with,  "long  sweet  bodies,"  mostly 
golden-haired  and  mostly  with  eyes  grey  or 
green.  Mr.  Hewlett  is  a  lover  of  women  and 
he  loves  them  honest.  In  this  he  is  a  striking 
contrast  to  Merimee„  for  instance,  most  of 
whose  heroines  are  wicked  either  by  nature 
or  choice.  In  Mr.  Hewlett's  books  even  his 
rips  have  their  redeeming  qualities,  are  rather 
the  product  of  their  environment  and  tragic 
circumstances  than  innately  evil,  are  pas- 
sionately anxious  to  do  th,e  right. 

So  in  these  stories,  no  matter  how  dire  the 
peril,  the  woman  triumphs,  saving  her  honour 
even  though  it  be  at  the  cost  of  life  itself. 

For  the  most  part,  the  women  of  the  "Little 
Novels"  are  lowly  in  origin;  as  Mr.  Hewlett 
would  phrase  it,  each  is  "a  madonna  of  the  re- 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

gion."  There  were  no  direct  sources  for  these 
tales.  In  each  of  the  five  cities  the  genius  loci 
spoke  to  the  poet-heart  of  this  novelist,  and  the 
madonna  of  th,e  place  suggested  her  own  type 
of  story.  This  madonna  was  the  typical 
woman  to  be  found  there  even  in  these  days 
by  the  discerning  visitor, —  the  honest,  good 
girl  who  "might  have  lived  and  died  in  her 
alley — sweetheart  of  some  half  dozen  decent 
fellows^  wife  of  the  most  masterful,  mother  of 
a  dozen  brats,  unnoticed  save  for  her  qualities 
of  cheerful  drudge  and  broodmare;  beautiful 
as  a  spring  leaf  till  twenty,  ripe  as  a  peach  on 
the  wall  till  thirty,  keen-faced  and  wise, 
mother  and  grandmother  at  forty ;  and  so  on — 
such  she  migfyt  have  lived  and  died  and  been 
none  the  worse  for  her  reclusion,  had  she 
not — "  and  there  the  story  begins. 

Simple  Giovanna  Scarpa,  happy  wife,  and 
happy  mother  of  a  son,  is  accused  of  wrong- 
doing with  a  handsome  priest  who  is  stoned 
from  the  city.    See  now  how  the  legend  grows : 

"A  belated  woman  with  a  baby  stumbles 
upon  a  company  of  shepherds  all  in  the  twit- 
tering dark.  Hearts  jump  to  mouths,  flesh, 
creeps,  hairs  stand  tiptoe — Madonna,  of  course ! 
Whom  else  could  they  call  her,  pray?     They 

66 


LITTLE  NOVELS  OF  ITALY 

don't  know  the  woman;  name  her  they  must. 
Well!  Who  is  there  they  don't  know  whose 
name  comes  readiest  to  the  tongue?  Madon- 
na, of  course.     Good:     Ecco  Madonna!" 

With  this  little  scene  as  the  climax,  Mr. 
Hewlett  works  both  backward  to  the  begin- 
ning and  forward  to  the  end.  It  is 
quite  a  pathetic  little  comedy  with  its  life 
story  of  Vanna,  its  tender  picture  of  her 
doting  motherhood,  its  warm  human  apprecia- 
tion of  the  Catholic  worship  of  the  Madonna, 
and  its  skilled  exposition  of  how  the  legend 
and  the  wonder  of  it  grew  and  grew  until  it 
had  become  fixed  in  the  traditions  of  a  city. 
And  all  this  is  garnished  with  swift  pictures 
of  shepherd  life,  of  tavern  life,  and  of  the 
wild  reckless  life  of  Can  Grande,  lord  of  Ve- 
rona. 

Mr.  Hewlett  does  not  devote  himself  to  the 
legend  exclusively.  He  composes  the  story 
out  of  which  conceivably  the  legend  grew  and 
so  makes  it  something  more  intimate,  more 
human  and  more  understandable. 

Ippolita,  likewise  lowly,  becomes  the  hero- 
ine of  a  comedy,  played  by  poetic  fantasts  and 
rough  shepherd  boys.  Content  to  dwell  in 
her  alley  and  be  wooed  for  wife,  she  is  seized 

67 


MAURIOE  HEWLETT 

by  Alessandro  del  Dardo  and  his  fellow  poets, 
male  and  female,  precieuses  all.  She  is  car- 
ried off  to  be  the  heroine  of  th,eir  silly  song. 
The  maid,  who  knows  more  about  the  prose 
of  the  kitchen  than  the  poetry  of  courts,  is 
told  of  the  lily  of  her  candour,  the  rose  of  her 
cheeks,  the  crocus  of  her  hair,  the  pink  anem- 
ones which  are  her  toes,  th.e  almond  of  her 
fingers.  She  sits  very  afraid  on  her  throne, 
not  comprehending  all  this  foolishness,  nor 
understanding  the  worship  wh,ich  uses  her  as 
a  figure  out  of  which  to  conjure  tropes,  rather 
than  as  a  warm  sweet-lipped  girl  ripe  for  kiss- 
ing. Is  it  any  wonder  that  finally,  disguised 
in  boy's  clothes,  she  makes  her  escape  to  the 
alluring  h,iHs  where  the  shepherd  boys  dwell? 
Here  she  toils,  here  she  is  knocked  down,  even 
as  Isoult  was  when  dwelling  with  the  char- 
coal burners  in  the  forest.  But  this  Ippolita 
is  not  an  Isoult  of  high  lineage.  No  knight  is 
reserved  for  her.  She  marries  the  shepherd 
who  knocked  her  down,  and  is  happy. 

"The  Duch,ess  of  Nona"  illustrates  another 
phase  of  woman's  love.  Handsome  English 
Mary  Lovell,  daughter  of  a  respectable  whar- 
finger of  Bankside  is  carried  off  as  wife  of 
Amilcare    Passavente,  who  under  the  spell  of 

68 


LITTLE  NOVELS  OF  ITALY 

her  cool  lips  and  her  pretty  clinging  ways,  be- 
comes a  poet,  calling  her  his  "Lady  White- 
throat"  and  other  names  as  endearing  and  as 
intimate.  But  the  honeymoon  is  soon  over 
and  Amilcare,  adventurer  and  soldier  of  for- 
tune, makes  himself  Duke  of  Nona  mainly 
through  his  handsome  Duchess,  who  wins  all 
men's  hearts  and  finally,  as  a  possession  for 
which  even  a  Borgia  is  willing  to  chaffer, 
brings  death  to  others  and  finds  cruel  death 
herself, — though  with  her  honour  unscathed. 

The  tale  of  Messer  Cino  turns  historical 
dates  topsy-turvy  and  treats  the  poet  with  dis- 
respect.    It  is  in  its  essence  a  farce  comedy. 

As  for  "The  Judgment  of  Borso,"  analysis 
is  not  easy.  It  is  such  a  filmy,  gauzy,  dainty 
little  comedy,  its  fun  is  so  contagious,  its 
spirit  so  audacious,  its  changes  of  scene  so  be- 
wildering, that  it  defies  compression  in  a  para- 
graph. It  is  a  story  of  the  romantic  love  of 
two,  hot-hearted  young  people  and  of  how 
their  passion  was  snatched  from  tragic  ending 
by  the  cool  judgment  of  Duke  Borso.  The 
author's  narrative  is  so  swift,  he  enjoys  its 
telling  so  keenly  himself,  he  relates  its  epi- 
sodes with  such  dash,  that  improbabilities 
are   forgotten.     The   magic    of   the   moment! 

69 


MAURIOE  HEWLETT 

The  reader  gives  himself  up  to  that  in  each 
of  these  wonderful  stories  in  which  Mr.  Hew- 
lett's art  touched  high  water  mark, — stories 
which  set  h,im  as  a  man  apart,  the  most  keen- 
visionedn  high-hearted,  and  poetically-equipped 
of  all  exponents  of  Italian  humanism. 


70 


RICHARD  YEA  AND  NAY. 


IF  you  love  the  very  words  Middle  Age; 
if  you  conjure  up  in  your  mind  glowing 
old  folios  of  black  letter  with  gilt  and 
florid  initials ;  crimson  and  blue  pages  in  which 
slim  ladies  with  spiked  headdresses  walk  amid 
sparse  flowers  and  trees  like  bouquets,  or 
wh,ere  men-at-arms  attack  walled  cities  no 
bigger  than  themselves,  or  long-legged  youths 
with  tight  waists  and  frizzed  hair  kiss  girls 
under  apple  trees;  or  a  king  is  on  a  dais  with 
gold  lillies  for  his  background,  minstrels  on 
their  knees  before  him,  lovers  in  the  gal- 
lery:— If  with  all  such  dainty  circumstances, 
you  can  be  pleased  and  not  offended  with  the 
shrewd  surmise  of  savagery  and  heathenism 
only  too  ready  to  go  naked,  then  you  will  do 
well" — not  to  go  Pistoja  as  Mr.  Hewlett 
eloquently  puts  it,  but  to  the  historical  ro- 
mance entitled,  "The  Life  and  Death  of  Rich- 
ard Yea  and  Nay." 

Mr.  Hewlett's  Richard  is  to  be  preferred  to 

71 


MAURiqE  HEWLETT 

Scott's  because  it  gives  the  truer  picture  of 
Rich,ard,  because  its  scope  is  more  ample,  its 
canvass  bigger,  its  figures  more  life-like,  its 
feeling  for  the  12th  century  more  correct  than 
that  of  Sir  (Walter  in  "The  Talisman,"  in 
which  he  is  generally  considered  to  have  pre- 
empted all  claim  to  Richard.  Scott  may  have 
been  as  much  a  student  of  medieval  times  as 
Mr.  Hewlett;  nay,  more  so,  but  whatever  his 
knowledge,  he  chose  to  suppress  some  of  the 
results  of  it.  Scott's  medieval  world  is 
always  a  dream  world,  peopled  by  gal- 
lant knights,  women  who  are  mere  em- 
bodiments of  a  knight's  ideal,  and  some  com- 
mon people.  Being  residents  in  a  dream 
world,  they  naturally  have  dream  manners. 
The  heathenism  of  real  medieval  men  be- 
neath their  thin  veneer  of  Christian  civili- 
zation, their  innate  love  of  blood,  their 
cruelty,  their  carelessness  as  to  the  suf- 
ferings of  the  baseborn,  even  their  indif- 
ference to  such  things  as  cleanliness, — when 
well  known  to  Sir  Walter — ,  are  never  ex- 
pressed in  his  romances.  None  of  the  Scott 
heroes  would  ever  praise  his  lady's  whiteness 
by  contrasting  it  with  the  blackness  of  his  own 
body,  unwashed  since  he  set  forth  in  the  wars. 

72 


RICHARD  YEA  AND  NAY 

And  just  as  he  is  discreet  to  the  point  of  sup- 
pression in  depicting  the  reverse  side  of  the 
shield,  so  is  he  likewise  discreet  in  his  treat- 
ment of  the  relation  between  the  sexes.  Hence 
there  are  practically  no  descriptions  of  erotic 
situations  at  all. 

This  much  must  be  said  for  truth's  sake. 
Scott's  reputation,  happily,  does  not  depend 
upon  his  Ivanhoes  and  his  Talismans,  but 
upon  immortal  pictures  of  Scotch  life,  upon  his 
Jennie  Deans  and  his  Bailie  Nicoll  Jarvies. 
However  much  Scott  the  innovator  may  have 
delighted  his  own  generation  with,  his  ro- 
mances of  the  Middle  Ages,  people  now  know 
that  the  Middle  Ages  were  not  a  stained  glass 
world,  where  knights  were  always  good  and 
where  ladies  fair  always  waited  to  be  wooed 
and  won. 

Human  passions  ran  just  as  high  then  as 
now,  nay  higher;  they  were  not  shackled  by 
the  thousand  restraints  put  upon  modern  men. 
Love  and  hate,  lust  for  battle  and  lust  for  the 
flesh,  were  big  things  in  life,  things  exploited 
with  frank,  even  brutal  candour.  And  there  is 
more  of  this  in  Mr.  Hewlett  than  in  Scott. 

Again  in  writing  historical  romances,  Mr. 
Hewlett  differs  from  his  great  predecessor  in 

73 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

other  particulars.  In  Scott,  the  great  historic 
personages  are  made  minor  figures  in  the 
novels;  in  Mr.  Hewlett's  book  they  are  made 
the  main  figures.  Scott  is  more  concerned  with 
the  story  of  the  adventures  of  some  romantic 
youth  and  maiden.  Mr.  Hewlett,  while  giving 
romance,  sh,ows  himself  a  child  of  his  age,  by 
attempting  a  phychological  analysis  of  his 
main  personage. 

Thackeray  does  not  tamper  with  historic 
fact  in  his  "Esmond."  He  takes  as  perhaps 
the  main  theme  a  perplexing  point,  such  as 
the  problem  as  to  why  Queen  Anne  failed  to 
try  to  pass  the  inheritance  of  the  crown  to  her 
Stuart  nephew.  Considering  each  known 
fact,  he  adds  to  it  others  and  makes  explana- 
tion of  the  problem.  He  extends  known  facts 
and  so  does  not  jar  one's  sense  of  the  probabili- 
ties. Mr.  Hewlett  wants  to  tell  Richard's 
story;  to  elucidate  the  seeming  contradictions 
in  his  character  and  career;  to  explain  him 
as  no  formal  biography  has  done.  To  this 
end,  h,e  adapts  part  of  the  method  of  Thack- 
eray. Given  certain  perplexing  problems  in 
Richard's  career  and  given  certain  known 
facts,  he  extends  them  by  inventions  of  his 
own.     But  he  is  not  always  consistent.     He 

74 


RICHARD  YEA  AND  NAY 

suppresses  where  it  is  necessary  to  aid  his  in- 
vention. 

However,  in  the  main,  he  is  guided  by  his- 
tory or  by  the  old  chroniclers,  even  to  the 
point  of  following  William  of  Newburgh  and 
Roger  of  Wendover  in  their  account  of  how 
the  Old  Man  of  Musse  sent  letters  to  Euro- 
pean monarchs  vindicating  Richard's  name 
from  any  stain  in  the  matter  of  the  Marquis 
Montferrat's  death.  With  certain  historical 
facts  upon  which  to  build  and  with  certain 
inventions  of  his  own  to  trick  out  the  romance, 
the  question  is  what  is  Hewlett's  attitude  to 
be?    He  answers  it  in  part  himself: 

"Differing  from  the  Mantuan  as  much  in 
sort  as  degree,  I  sing  less  arms  than  the  man, 
less  the  panoply  of  some  Christian  king  of- 
fended than  the  heart  of  one  in  its  urgent, 
private  transports;  less  treaties  than  the 
agony  of  treating,  less  personages  than  per- 
sons, the  actors  rather  than  the  scene.  Arms 
pass  like  the  fashion  of  them,  today  or  to- 
morrow they  will  be  gone;  but  men  live, 
their  secret  springs  what  they  have  always 
been." 

In  other  words,  he  writes  a  biographical- 
historical-phychological      romance.        History 

75 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

records  that  Rich,ard  was  "a  bad  son,  a  bad 
husband,  a  selfish  ruler,  and  a  vicious  man." 
If  this  were  all  of  him,  there  would  be  nothing 
to  write  but  a  book  of  nays.  However,  there 
must  have  been  more,  historians  to  the  con- 
trary notwithstanding. 

No  man,  entirely  compounded  of  bad  quali- 
ties, could  have  captivated  the  fancy  of  the 
people  of  his  own  time  and  survived  as  a 
heroic  legend  for  centuries  thereafter.  It  is 
Mr.  Hewlett's  business,  therefore,  to  set 
forth  the  yeas. 

This  is  done  by  citation  of  historic  occur- 
rences and  by  narration  of  imagined  ones, 
by  testimony  of  Bertran  de  Born  and  by  ex- 
tracts from  the  supposititious  chronicle  of  the 
Abbot  Milo.  Richard  is  viewed  from  various 
stand  points  and  always  there  is  impressed  the 
dual  nature  of  the  man, — the  evil  warring  with 
the  good.  "He  is  ever  of  two  minds,"  says  De 
Born,  "hot  head  and  cold  heart,  flaming  heart 
and  chilled  head.  He  will  be  for  God  and  the 
enemy  of  God;  will  expect  heaven  and  tamper 
with,  hell.  With  rage  he  will  go  up,  laughing 
come  down.  Ho!  He  will  be  for  you  and 
against  you;  eager,  slow;  a  wooer,  a  scorner; 
a  singer  of  madrigals,  ah,  and  a  croaker  after- 

76 


RICHARD  YEA  AND  NAY 

wards.  There  is  no  stability  in  him,  neither 
length  of  love  nor  hate,,  no  bottom,  little 
faith." 

This  might  be  said  to  be  the  key  to  Richard 
as  Mr.  Hewlett  sees  him.  He  makes  only  one 
exception,  in  only  one  thing  is  Richard  stable, 
— his  love  for  Jehane  of  whom  he  says,  "I 
will  marry  the  French  girl  and  love  my  golden 
Jehane  until  I  die." 

Love  for  the  golden  Jehane  and  love  for 
the  Cross — of  these  two  inspirations  Mr. 
Hewlett  makes  his  story.  The  tragedy  of 
Richard's  life  comes  from  the  conflict  of  the 
two  passions.  If  Richard  desires  to  enter 
upon  the  crusade,  he  must  needs  have  money; 
if  he  wants  money,  he  must  needs  make  al- 
liance with  some  wealthy  sovereign;  if  he 
makes  such  an  alliance,  he  must  needs  do  so 
by  wedding  the  daughter  of  the  gold-bestow- 
er. 

Thus  Richard  is  placed  at  the  crossroads  of 
his  career.  He  must  forego  Jehane  or  the  cru- 
sade. In  his  passionate  way,  he  declares  he 
will  do  neither.  It  is  then  that  Jehane,  worked 
upon  by  the  Queen  Mother,  prevails  upon 
him  to  give  her  up. 

And,  of  course,  it  is  largely  out  of  this  act 

77 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

of  self-abnegation  on  the  one  hand  and  dis- 
appointment on  the  other,  that  the  subsequent 
chain  of  tragic  events  grows.  Indeed,  it  is  just 
here  that  the  touch  of  artificiality  comes  in. 
In  the  "Book  of  Yea"  everything  goes  well 
for  Richard ;  he  woos  and  wins  the  fair  Jehane ; 
he  wins  in  the  quarrels  with  his  father;  he 
succeeds  to  the  throne  of  ;England  and  is 
crowned  both  there  and  in  his  French  lands. 
The  book  ends  with  his  agreement  to  wed 
Berengere. 

In  the  "Book  of  Nay,"  everything  goes 
wrong  with  Richard.  His  sacrifice  of  Jehane 
turns  to  dead  sea  fruit,  and  he  puts  his  little 
Queen  away.  His  crusade  to  the  Holy  Land 
is  rendered  abortive  by  the  quarrels  of  his 
allies  and  associates,  largely  brought  on  by 
his  own  hasty  temper  and  passionate  pride. 
He  does  brave  deeds  in  vain.  He  is  finally 
forced  to  leave  the  land,  to  taste  the  bitterness 
of  captivity ;  to  fight  for  every  inch  of  his  way 
to  his  own  domains;  and  finally  to  have  as 
ashes  in  the  mouth  the  knowledge  that  his 
life  was  probably  purchased  by  Jehane's 
supreme  sacrifice  of  herself. 

Richard  is  presented  as  drawn  by  the  chron- 
iclers   of    his    time.      Holding    forth    on    his 

78 


RICHARD  YEA  AND  NAY 

chosen  way,  he  accepts  from  all  and  gives 
little.  Men  die  for  him,  women  break  their 
hearts  for  him  and  finally — in  this  story — he 
dies,  a  man  disappointed,  a  man  balked  in  his 
greatest  desires.  Mr.  Hewlett  has  managed 
to  convey  not  only  a  vivid  realization  of  his 
qualities  as  soldier  and  leader,  not  only  a 
glimpse  of  his  tempests  of  passion,  but  of  the 
fundamentally  religious  nature  of  the  man 
when  touched  and  of  the  riotous  poet  heart  of 
him,  that  French  poet  who  exclaims  in  agony 
when  he  realizes  the  need  of  forgetting  the 
woman  he  has  given  up:  "Oh,  Gaston,  let 
us  get  to  the  South,  see  the  sun  fleck  the  roads, 
smell  the  oranges!" 

The  fair  Jehane  St  Pol,  whom  the  author 
says  Richard  loved  from  first  to  last,  is  his 
typical  heroine.  She  is  beautiful,  as  a  matter 
of  course.  And  even  as  her  beauty  corres- 
ponds to  the  Hewlett  ideal,  so  her  actions 
are  of  a  piece  with,  the  Hewlett  model.  She 
is  a  woman  all  meek  and  lowly  in  her  lover's 
hands,  ready  to  make  any  sacrifice  for  him. 
She  gives  him  herself  without  the  sanctities 
of  the  marriage  bond.  When  he  would  wed 
her  and  crown  h,er  Queen,  she  puts  aside  her 
honour  for  his  good.  When  his  life  is  in  danger, 

79 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

she  sells  herself  to  buy  his  safety.  And  this  is 
one  of  the  big  blemishes  in  the  book.  It  is  not 
in  accord  with,  art  and  it  is  not  in  accord  with 
life.  That  this  girl,  so  passionate  and  yet  in 
essence  so  pure,  could  sell  h,erself,  could  be- 
come the  plaything  of  the  disgusting  Old 
Man  of  Musse  with  his  harem  of  concubines, 
could  conceive  an  affection  for  th,e  Oriental 
and  bear  him  three  sons, — this  is  too  great  a 
strain  on  credulity,  too  shocking  to  one's  con- 
ception of  what  Jehane  was  like,  too  cheapen- 
ing of  her  in  every  way.  It  is  nauseous  and 
not  even  the  pleading  of  a  friendly  critic  like 
Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  can  convince  to  the 
contrary;  not  even  the  citation  that  th,is  was 
the  wild  1 2th  century  of  Heloisa,  of  Con- 
stance, and  of  the  period  when  Richard  was 
reported  to  have  offered  his  sister  in  marriage 
to  the  brother  of  Saladin. 

Perhaps  the  best  character  drawing  in  the 
book  is  that  of  the  Abbot  Milo,  a  Carthusian 
monk,  abbot  of  the  cloister  of  Saint  Mary-of- 
the-Pine  in  Poictiers,  lifelong  friend  of  the 
king,  and  his  almoner  and  chronicler. 

Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  says  there  was  such 
a  personage  and  that  h,e  wrote  a  book  about 
Richard  which  has  been  lost.     Mr.   Hewlett 

80 


RICHARD  YEA  AND  NAY 

has  breathed  the  breath  of  life  into  Milo  and 
re-written  his  lost  book.  The  Abbot  stands  be- 
fore the  reader  a  "red-faced,  watery-eyed  old 
man,  rheumy  and  weathered  well."  He  is 
learned  in  all  the  lore  of  his  age;  he  is  fond  of 
rhetoric,  of  high  phrases,  and  of  long  dis- 
sertations. He  is  angry  at  interruptions.  He 
likes  to  read  even  kings  and  princes  a  lesson. 

It  is  from  the  writings  of  this  priest  that 
Mr.  Hewlett  pretends  to  draw  justification 
for  his  inventions.  The  extracts  from  Milo's 
supposititious  history  lend  just  the  air  of 
verity  to  the  novel  that  it  needed  to  help  over- 
come scruples  when  confronted  by  certain 
aspects  of  the  story.  Mr  Hewlett  either  tells 
a  thing  and  then  corroborates  it  from  Milo's 
book,  or  else  gives  the  extract  from  Milo 
alone. 

Now  as  to  th,e  English  of  the  novel.  In  the 
main,  there  are  two  ways  of  telling  a  histori- 
cal tale.  If  one  follows  Scott,  he  gives  the 
narrative  partly  in  the  English  of  today,  but 
the  dialogue  in  what  is  supposed  to  be  the 
language  of  the  period  chosen.  If  one  follows 
the  Thackeray  of  "Esmond,"  one  chooses  the 
harder  course.  In  "Esmond,"  Thackeray  re- 
produced the  English  of  Anne's  day  not  only 

81 


MAURIOE  HEWLETT 

in  the  dialogue,  but  also  in  the  narrative 
proper.  Mr  Hewlett  has  used  something  of 
the  method  of  both,-  His  dialogue  attempts 
to  reproduce  the  spirit  of  the  times. 

There  is  none  of  the  glorified  bombast,  for 
instance,,  of  Scott's  King.  Mr  Hewlett's 
Richard  talks  more  like  a  human  being  of  the 
1 2th  century.  His  language  is  that  of  the 
fighting  Troubadour  King,  a  language  of  po- 
etic fancies,  queer  oaths,  elliptical  expressions 
such  as  men  used  in  real  life.  The  rolls  and 
chronicles  of  Richard's  time,  to  which  Bishop 
Stubbs  wrote  such,  fascinatingly  learned  pre- 
faces, have  been  studied  by  Mr.  Hewlett  with 
the  greatest  of  care.  From  them  he  gathered 
something  of  the  atmosphere  of  the  times; 
something  of  the  language  that  was  then  used ; 
something  of  the  manner  of  speaking.  But 
he  has  not  slavishly  followed  them.  From 
the  poets,  from  the  dramatists  of  Elizabeth's 
day,  from  northern  and  provincial  dialects,  he 
has  gathered  good  out-of-the-way  words  and 
has  allowed  them  to  filter  through  and  colour 
his  narrative  with,  a  quaint  medieval  tinge 
that  makes  it  the  proper  setting  for  the  dia- 
logue. The  narrative  is  thus  modern,  but 
with  a  suggestion  of  the  antique. 

82 


RICHARD  YEA  AND  NAY 

One  more  point  remains  to  be  made.     Per- 
haps  the   truest    definition   of   Mr.    Hewlett's 
"Richard"  would  be  to  call  it  a  chronicle  novel, 
even  as  ten  out  of  37  of  Shakespeare's  dramas 
are  chronicle  plays,  in  the  strictest  sense  of 
the  word.     The  play  of  this  order  applies  to 
lay  history  the  methods  of  dramatic  narration. 
The  chronicle  novel  such  as  Mr.  Hewlett  gives, 
applies   to  lay   history   the   methods   of  nov- 
elistic  narration.    The  chronicle  play  recounts 
what  happened  in  the  reign  of  a  particular  king, 
what  incidents  led  to  his  accession,  what  epi- 
sodes marked   h,is  fall   or   death.     It   is   very 
much  the  same  with  the  chronicle  novel.    The 
play  tended  to  develop  into  one  of  three  forms, 
— the  comedy  of  manners,  the  romantic  play, 
or  the  tragedy.    "Richard,"  has  nothing  of  the 
comedy  of  manners,  but  it  does  have  the  ro- 
mance, and  it  closes  upon  a  note  of  tragedy. 
In  fact,  in  a  sense,  the  whole  book  is  a  tragedy, 
the  tragedy  of  the  failure  of  a  great  lover  and 
of  a  great  crusader  and  king,  of  a  man  de- 
feated by  the  cross  currents  of  life  and  fate 
and  passion. 

Even  in  the  best  of  the  chronicle  plays,  it 
is  not  the  plot  which  tells,  but  the  episodes, 

83 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

and  such  unity  as  th,ey  have  comes  from  such 
figures  as  Hotspur,  Richard  III.,  and  Henry  V. 
moving  through  the  various  scenes  and  being 
affected  by  them. 

In  the  chronicle  novel,  as  in  th,e  play,  many 
things  happen,  but  the  actions  are  mainly  in 
sequence,  because  historically  they  did  happen 
in  just  th,at  order.  They  do  not  grow  clearly 
out  of  preceding  causes,  such  as  are  necessary 
in  the  novel  conforming  to  the  canons  of  the 
art.  To  overcome  such  defects,  the  chronicle 
novelist  is  put  to  the  straits  of  inventing 
motives  and  causes  in  explanation  of  known 
historical  happenings.  Thus  the  prophecy  of 
a  leper  impels  Jehane  to  refuse  to  become 
•Richard's  Queen;  Montferrat's  death  is  pur- 
chased by  Jehane  selling  herself,  etc.,  etc. 

The  tendency  is  ultimately  for  a  chronicle 
play  to  become  what  has  been  aptly  termed 
"Sublimated  melodrama."     Th,e  melodramatic 

also  often  pervades  the  chronicle  novel. 

With  these  considerations,  is  "Richard"  a 
success? 

Mr,  Hewlett's  art  of  narrative  was  never 
truer.  His  battle  pieces  hold  th,e  interest  to 
full  measure.     His  death  bed  scene  in  Rich- 

84 


RICHARD  YEA  AND  NAY 

ard's  tent  moves  to  tears.  His  pictures  of 
faraway  places  glow  with  the  fervour  of  their 
faraway  sun.  His  style  follows  suit.  It  is  a 
"galliard"  style,  full,  rich,  high,  and  fantastic 
as  suits  the  subject,  but  grave  and  simple 
when  the  situation  demands.  The  novel 
abounds  in  tense  dramatic  situations.  Its 
etchings  of  the  great  men  of  the  past  are  su- 
perb, the  three  women,  Alois,  Berengere  and 
Jehane  are  admirably  contrasted  throughout; 
their  characters  are  revealed  not  only  by  their 
words,  but  by  their  actions. 

But  the  book  is  not  a  success. 

It  lacks  unity;  it  lacks  a  great  central  plot; 
the  very  division  into  the  "Book  of  Yea"  and 
the  "Book  of  Nay"  indicates  this.  A  chronicle 
novel  dealing  with  Richard  should  have  him 
always  as  the  main  figure  on  the  stage.  But 
this  is  not  the  case  here.  Occasionally  he  is 
lost  sight  of  while  lesser  persons  claim  the 
reader's  attention. 

There  is  still  another  fault.  The  book  lacks 
verisimilitude.  There  are  jarring  passages. 
There  is  an  unhealthy  dwelling  upon  the  pas- 
sion of  Berengere,  bride  but  not  wife.  There 
is  too  great  a  strain  upon  credulity  in  the  sac- 

85 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

rifice  of  Jehane  to  the  Old  Man  of  Musse. 
This  seems  melodramatic,  "stagey"  and 
forced,  rather  than  true  to  romance  and  to 
life.  In  short  the  book  is  a  failure,  magnificent 
but  none  the  less  a  failure. 


86 


NEW  CANTERBURY  TALES. 


IT  sometimes  almost  seems  as  if  the  books  in 
Mr.  Hewlett's  library  tease  him  into  trying 
his  skill  in  treating  subjects  already  used 
by  acknowledged  masters  of  literature.  Scott's 
"Talisman"  did  not  debar  him  from  taking 
Richard  as  a  hero.  The  myriad  books  about 
Mary,  did  not  affright  him  from  his  purpose  of 
setting  forth  the  tragedy  of  the  Scottish 
Queen.  In  1901  he  flung  down  another  rather 
daring  challenge  to  the  critical  by  his  "New 
Canterbury  Tales,"  a  title  and  subject  sure  to 
arouse  the  wrath  of  some  of  the  professed 
Chaucerians  and  also  of  thpse  who  praise 
Chaucer  without  having  read  him. 

Mr.  Hewlett  was  not  unaware  of  the  criti- 
cism that  would  be  heaped  upon  his  head  for 
his  audacity.  He  was  ready  with  his  apologia. 
In  fact,  it  is  contained  in  th,e  very  first 
words  of  his  prologue : 

"Pray  do  not  suppose  that  Chaucer's  were 
the  only  pilgrims  to  woo  the  Canterbury  way 
with  stories,  nor  that  theirs  was  the  only  road 

87 


MAURIQE  HEWLETT 

by  wh,ich  to  seek  the  Head  of  Thomas.  His 
people  may  have  set  the  fashion  and  himself 
a  tantalizing  standard  of  attainment;  but  that 
is  a  poor-hearted  chronicler  who  withholds 
a  tale  because  some  other  has  told  one  well." 

Omitting  the  unfortunate — and  forced — 
comparison  with  greatness  crowned  by  Time's 
verdict,  the  only  fair  test  that  should  be  made 
is  the  one  in  answer  to  the  question:  What 
of  this  work  absolutely,  without  reference  to 
anything  that  has  been  written  on  similar 
th,emes  before? 

And  the  best  answer  to  the  question  seems 
to  be  the  remark  the  London  Athenaeum  was 
moved  to  make  when  the  book  appeared,  viz 
that  "Mr.  Hewlett,  now  that  Stevenson  is 
dead,  is  certainly  the  prince  of  literary  story- 
tellers." 

The  book  is  a  real  contribution  to  literature 
and  at  least  two  of  the  stories  are  among  the 
best  things  that  Mr.  Hewlett  has  done. 

Having  adopted  a  Chaucerian  title,  he  also 
adopted  the  Chaucerian  scheme.  Each  tale 
is  such  as  the  specific  character,  to  whom  it  is 
credited,  might  have  told,  although  the  author 
says:  "I  ask  you  to  be  more  concerned  with 
the  tales  than  the  teller." 

88 


NEW  CANTERBURY  TALES 

Chaucer's  pilgrims  started  from  the  Tabard 
Inn,  Southwark,  and  it  is  not  clear  whether 
the  journey  was  to  be  made  in  one,  two,  or 
four  days.  They  set  forth  on  April  28,  1388. 
Sixty-two  years  later,  on  May-day  1450,  Hew- 
lett's pilgrims  set  forth  from  Winchester. 
There  is  no  doubt  as  to  the  stages  of  their 
journey.     They  are  carefully  set  down. 

One  of  the  superb  gems  of  Chaucer's  poem 
is  of  course  the  masterly  prologue  upon  which 
so  many  commentators  have  expended  their 
eloquence.  Mr.  Hewlett  very  wisely  avoids 
th,e  mistake  of  trying  to  do  for  his  prose  book 
what  Chaucer  did  for  his  master  work.  There 
is  a  prologue,  it  is  true,  rather  quaintly  set 
forth  in  language  that  conveys  a  tone  of  the 
archaic,  but  it  is  swift  and  to  the  point. 

The  reader  is  made  acquainted  with  the 
Prioress  of  Ambresbury  in  Wilts,  born  Tou- 
chett  of  Merton,  a  stately  dame  but  with  a 
tender  spot  for  minstrels,  young  women,  and 
boys.  He  meets  Dan  Costard,  her  confessor, 
so  charmingly  described  as  a  "loose-skinned 
old  man  with  mild  blue  eyes,  coloured  (as 
it  seemed)  by  that  Heaven  which  he  daily 
sought."  Then  there  are  Mistress  Mawdleyn, 
niece   of   the    Prioress;    Percival   Perceforest, 

89 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

page  to  Mawdleyn's  father  and  lover  of  Mawd- 
leyn;  Captain  Salamon  Brazenhead,  swash 
buckler,  of  whom  more  in  a  later  chapter,  and 
various  commoners  mentioned  as  a  "Scrivener 
of  London,"  Master  Richard  Smith,  Mariner 
from  Kingston-upon-Hull,  and  the  latter's 
wife. 

So  much  for  the  prologue  and  the  charac- 
ters, Now  as  to  the  tales  they  tell.  Chaucer 
was  a  child  of  the  Middle  Ages.  He  was  med- 
ieval in  his  style  and  in  the  turn  of  his 
phrases.  He  freely  resorted  to  a  mixture  of 
the  names  and  associations  of  his  own  times 
with  those  of  the  pre-Christian  era.  His 
morality  was  often  the  overstrained  morality 
of  the  Middle  Ages,  as  demonstrated  in  the 
famous  tale  of  the  patient  Griselda.  He  was 
not  above  the  superstitions  of  his  time,  as  is 
shown  in  his  Prioress'  tale,  one  of  those  cruel 
calumnies  against  the  Jews  so  current  then 
and  still  so  current  even  today  in  darkest  Rus- 
sia and  Roumania.  His  naivete  is  perhaps 
not  literary  style  so  much  as  the  tone  due 
to  the  period  in  which  he  wrote.  It  was  per- 
haps the  tone  of  all  writing  men  then,  height- 
ened in  him  by  something  peculiarly  lovable 
and  childlike.    Mr.  Hewlett  has  imitated  these 

90 


NEW  CANTERBURY  TALES 

things  only  in  part.  His  tales  are  such  as  the 
Middle  Ages  rejoiced  in.  They  avoid,  for 
the  most  part,  modern  thought,  colour  and 
feeling,  without  attempting  a  distinctly  archa- 
ic style.  In  fact,  their  style  rather  suggests 
than  reproduces  the  manner  of  the  Middle 
Ages. 

If  Chaucer  holds  up  Griselda  and  Constance 
as  the  pattern  of  model  women,  Mr.  Hewlett 
gives  their  sister  in  Alys.  If  Chaucer  gives 
superstition  in  the  story  of  the  little  child 
whose  throat  was  cut  by  the  wicked  Jews  be- 
cause he  sang  so  sweetly  "O  alma  redemp- 
toris  mater,"  Mr.  Hewlett,  too,  reproduces 
th,e  feeling  of  that  old  time  by  his  story  of 
that  other  sweet  singer,  Gervase  of  Plessy. 

After  all,  however,  Mr.  Hewlett  writes  in 
the  present  ei*a.  The  tales  he  spins  are 
too  subtle  to  have  come  down  from  Chaucer's 
time.  Their  stroke  is  too  swift;  their  manage- 
ment too  scientific.  They  have  a  humour  which 
ventures  often  very  close  to  grossness,  but 
always  held  in  check  by  a  proper  regard  for 
finer  taste  and  by  deep  reverence  for  the 
Catholic  mysteries.  The  art  of  their  plot  con- 
struction is  too  greatly  dexterous  and  too  fine- 
ly poised  to  be  anything  other  than  that  of  a 

9i 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

writer  who  lives  in  an  era  that  is  heir  to  all  the 
ages  that  have  gone  before. 

Of  the  six  tales  given  by  Mr.  Hewlett,  one 
only  has  a  definite  source  and  that  is  Frois- 
sart,  combined  with  a  legend  of  the  founda- 
tion of  the  Order  of  the  Garter.  The  others 
are  Mr.  Hewlett's  own.  They  are  perhaps  to 
be  paralleled  in  the  legends  of  the  saints,  in 
Italian  novelle,  and  in  ancient  chronicles  of 
medieval  wars.  They  are  the  result  of  the 
author's  wide  reading  of  medieval  literature. 
It  is  th,e  learned  scrivener  who  gives  the  tale 
of  the  Countess  Alys;  it  is  the  man  of  re- 
ligious fervour,  Dan  Costard,  who  tells  the 
tale  of  the  trials  of  the  hermit  Vigilas;  it  is 
the  bombastic  swashbuckler,  Brazenhead,  who 
relates  a  story  of  medieval  Italy.  Two  of  the 
stories,  "Th,e  Half  Brothers"  and  "Eugenio 
and  Galeotto"  are  "Little  Novels  of  Italy." 
"The  Cast  of  the  Apple"  is  such  a  tale  as  Wil- 
liam Morris  might  have  told. 

The  story  of  "Gervase  of  Plessy"  is  some- 
thing like  those  one  may  read  in  the  compila- 
tions of  legends  concerning  the  saints.  With 
Chaucer's  Prioress'  story,  it  is  a  companion 
piece  to  the  legends  of  Saint  Hugh  of  Lincoln 
and  Saint  William  of  Norwich.     There  is  a 

92 


NEW  CANTERBURY  TALES 

jarring  note  in  the  story,  however,  that  spoils 
all  the  effect  of  its  studied  simplicity.  The 
blemish  is  the  tone  of  eroticism  in  the  semi- 
sane  mothering  mood  of  Sornia  towards  Ger- 
vase.  One  of  the  two  notable  stories  of  the 
book  is  the  Scrivener's  tale  of  the  Countess 
Alys.  "I  propose  a  tale,"  says  the  Scrivener, 
"All  in  the  manner  of  that  noble  clerk  and 
fellow  of  my  mystery  Master  Geoffrey 
Chaucer." 

And  again,  "Although  rhyme  shall  be  lack- 
ing (for  I  am  no  rhymester  for  choice)  I  prom- 
ise you  the  other  elements  of  art,  as  balance, 
careful  heed  to  longs  and  shorts,  proportion, 
exquisite  choice." 

What  the  Scrivener  says  of  his  story,  can 
truly  be  said  of  Mr.  Hewlett's  work.  There 
is  indeed  balance,  careful  heed  to  proportion, 
an  exquisite  choice,, — for  this  is  a  pearl  of  a 
story,  perfect  in  its  tone,  medieval  in  spirit  and 
denouement.  Froissart  tells  something  of  this 
Alys,  Countess  of  Salisbury;  of  how  she  de- 
fended her  husband's  castle  of  Wark  while  the 
master  was  a  prisoner  in  France;  of  how  King 
Edward,  coming  to  lift  the  siege,  remained  to 
beleaguer  the  heart  of  the  lady ;  of  how  she 
resisted  him;  and  of  how,  later  in  his  career, 

93 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

he  had  her  as  his  guest  of  honor  at  a  great 
tournament.  Legend  tells  that  the  Order  of 
the  Garter  was  founded  in  her  honor  when 
base-minded  men  sniggered  as  the  king  picked 
up  the  lady's  dropped  garter.  So  much  for 
origins.  Mr.  Hewlett  has  given  the  story 
a  setting  of  his  own.  He  has  filled  it  with 
medieval  colour  and  spirit;  he  has  drawn  a 
noble  portrait  of  Alys,  greatly  tried,  greatly 
enduring,  "who  had  a  wild  look,  with  some 
audacity  and  much,  innocent  hardihood;  as 
though  like  Taillefer  at  Senlac,  she  played 
with  her  virtue,  tossing  it  up,  but  always 
catching  it  again." 

With  true  artistic  instinct,  Mr.  Hewlett  has 
elaborated  the  old  chronicles  and  the  old 
legend  into  a  tale  of  dramatic  interest.  There 
is  the  double  theme  of  the  lust  of  the  King 
for  the  fair  virtuous  Alys,  and  of  the  humble, 
self-denying  love  of  her  by  the  poor  scholar, 
Lancelot,  tutor  of  her  children.  Lancelot,  is 
an  invention  by  Mr.  Hewlett,  as  is  also  the 
death  of  the  Earl  of  Salisbury  and  the  plotting 
of  Pandarus  the  First,  Alys'  base  brother,  and 
Pandarus  the  Second,  Alys'  stepson. 

Throughout,  without  any  undue  emphasis 
upon  the  point,  the  tale  is  a  noble  vindication 

94 


NEW  CANTERBURY  TALES 

of  the  steadfastness  of  the  good  wife,  who  em- 
bodies in  herself  all  the  medieval  ideals  of 
what  sh,e  should  be, — sweet,  loving,  virtuous, 
long-suffering,  careful  of  her  husband's  hon- 
our, good  name,  castles,  fiefs,  and  goods. 

The  most  powerful  story  in  the  book,  how- 
ever, is  an  entirely  new  departure  for  Mr. 
Hewlett.  "Peridore  and  Paravail"  is  an  ex- 
cursion into  the  horrible  and  terrifying. 
It  is  an  examination  of  a  mind  diseased.  It 
irresistibly  calls  up  for  comparison  Flaubert's 
"La  Tentation  de  Sainte  Antoine"  and  is  not 
unworthy  the  hand  of  that  master  in  the  study 
of  the  horrible  and  the  bizarre.  However,  it 
is  more  compact,  it  is  more  easily  understood 
by  the  many  than  Flauberts'  work,  and  it  is 
relieved  by  a  love  story  of  great  sweetness 
and  purity.  It  is  filled  from  end  to  end  with 
the  shadow  of  the  superstitions  of  the  Middle 
Ages.  "Old  Legion"  is  a  very  terrifying  fig- 
ure. Witch.es  perch  on  eaves  of  houses  and 
gibber  of  their  diabolical  plots.  All  of  the 
forces  of  evil  strive  to  outwit  mortal  inten- 
ions  and  win  souls  from  God.  The  blessed 
Vigilas  was  a  hermit  of  Cauntrip,  who  dwelt 
in  a  hut  by  Bleme  Barrow  under  the  shadow 
of  the  Druse  ring.     He  saw  visions  and  did 

95 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

marvels  daily  by  reason  of  his  fastings,  his 
prayers,  and  his  flagellations  of  the  too  re- 
bellious flesh.  He  was  forty  and  had  led  a 
saintly  life  for  thirty  years,  when  he  found 
the  babe  whom  h,e  named  Paravail  and  who 
grew  up  a  slip  of  a  girl  whose  hair  was  the 
colour  of  dormice  and  with  feet  lighter  than 
a  hare's.  This  Paravail  was  withput  a  soul, 
for  she  was  weaned  after  one  month  with  a 
foster-mother  whom  Vigilas  found  for  her. 
And  so  she  grew  up  to  be  at  once  his  torment 
and  h,is  delight.  She  was  a  wild  thing  such 
as  Mr.  Hewlett  loves  to  depict, — one  of  those 
denizens  of  the  forest  who  run  with  the  hares, 
hide  with  the  foxes,  swim  like  the  otter,  are 
sib  with,  all  soulless  creatures,  alien  only  from 
men  and  women.  And  then  the  beginning  of 
Vigilas'  madness  comes  upon  him.  One 
moment  the  flesh  that  has  been  subdued  for 
so  long  rebels,  and  he  loves  the  girl's  beauty. 
The  next,  h,e  sees  in  her  a  device  of  the  evil 
one  to  lure  him  to  deepest  Hell. 

Into  her  little  world  there  comes  Peridore, 
the  shepherd  boy,  her  one  month  fosterling. 
Tfyey  love,  wildly,  yet  innocently,  even  as 
Aglae  and  Neanias.  Indeed,  there  is  quite 
a  parallel  in  the  relations  between  the  two 
pairs  of  lovers. 

96 


NEW  CANTERBURY  TALES 

It  was  Neanias  who  warmed  Aglae's  cold, 
who  taught  her  human  speech,  wh,o  revealed 
to  her  that  she  had  a  soul,  who  rescued  her 
from  the  terrifying  attendants  of  Pan.  So, 
in  this  tale,  it  is  Peridore  who  rescues  Para- 
vail,  not  only  from  the  fanatic  tyranny  of 
Vigilas,  not  only  from  the  eerie  scheming  of 
the  witches,  but  who  takes  her  to  the  Holy 
Mount  where  there  are  those  who  find  a  soul 
for  her,  so  that  she  will  be  a  fitting  mate  for 
the  sturdy  shepherd  lad  who  has  loved  her 
well. 

With  Peridore's  advent,  the  madness  of 
Vigilas  reaches  its  climax.  His  soul  becomes 
a  battle-ground  for  angels  and  fiends.  The 
angels  tell  lym  to  let  Paravail  go,  as  youth  is 
calling  to  youth.  The  fiends  tell  him  to  keep 
her  for  his  own.  He  resolves  to  take  her  home. 
He  will  "look  and  long,  but  curse  her;  and 
love,  but  chastise;  and  fear,  but  dare  her  do 
me  harm."  And  so  this  madman  takes  the 
girl  into  the  hut  where  he  keeps  her  prisoner. 

It  is  at  the  height  of  his  madness,  when 
fright  and  starvation  have  rendered  Paravail 
as  one  who  is  dead,  that  Peridore  knocks 
Vigilas  down  and  bears  off  the  girl,  away  from 
the  hermit  and  the  wrangling  witches  whom 

97 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

he  hears  in  the  woods,  away  to  the  Holy 
Mount.  When  Paravail  has  a  soul,  she  sets 
forth  with  Peridore. 

The  story  is  one  which,  in  its  terrifying  im- 
agination and  superstition,  is  medieval  to  the 
core.  But  there  is  something  deeper  than 
that  in  it.  This  story  of  a  loveless  hermit- 
saint,  undone  by  his  savage  asceticism  portrays 
a  moving  mental  tragedy.  Step  by  step  there 
is  shown  the  breakdown  of  a  brain.  Disease 
gradually  destroys  sanity  until  nothing  but 
religious  madness  is  left.  It  is  horrible,  but 
only  as  is  the  actual  tragedy  of  diseased 
minds.  There  is  a  compelling  sincerity  in 
the  picture  that  fills  with  pity.  It  hurts  be- 
cause of  its  very  truth.  It  throws  a  flashlight 
into  the  darker  corners  of  the  human  brain 
and  shows  the  dangers  that  lurk  when  the  deli- 
cate fibres  begin  to  weaken.  For  the  first 
time  one  begins  to  understand  those  mad 
eremites  of  the  dark  ages,  their  fanaticism, 
their  flagellation  of  the  bleeding  flesh,  their 
acts  of  dark  savagery,  seemingly  unrelieved 
by  any  semblance  of  human  feeling. 


98 


THE   QUEEN'S    QUAIR. 


A  BOOK  about  Queen  Mary— if  it  be 
honest — has  no  business  to  be  a  gen- 
teel exercise  in  the  romantic;  if  the 
truth  is  to  be  told,  let  it  be  h,ere.  *  *  *  A 
hundred  books  have  been  written,  a  hundred 
songs  sung;  men  enough  of  these  latter  days 
have  broken  their  hearts  for  Queen  Mary's. 
What  is  more  to  the  matter  is  that  no  heart 
but  hers  was  broken  in  time.  All  the  world 
can  love  her  now;  but  who  loved  her  then? 
Not  a  man  among  them.  A  few  girls  went 
weeping;  a  few  boys  laid  down  their  necks 
that  sh,e  might  walk  free  of  the  mire.  Alas! 
the  mire  swallowed  them  up,  and  she  must 
soil  her  pretty  feet.  This  is  the  nut  of  the 
tragedy;  pity  is  involved  rather  than  terror. 
But  no  song  ever  pierced  the  fold  of  her 
secret,  no  book  ever  found  out  the  truth,  be- 
cause none  ever  sought  her  heart.  Here,  then, 
is  a  book  which  has  sought  nothing  else,  and 
a  song  which  springs  from  that  only;  called 

99 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

on  th,at  same  account,  'The  Queen's  Quair.' " 
This,  from  the  author's  prologue,  will 
serve  to  show  that  Mr.  Hewlett  was  fully 
aware  of  the  difficulties  in  his  path;  of  the 
cry  that  would  go  up  that  he  was  treading 
in  well-trodden  path,s,  which  had  been  pur- 
sued before  him  by  men  of  no  less  rank  in 
their  respective  countries  than  Scott  and 
Schiller  and  Alfieri  and  Swinburne.  It  was  a 
bold  undertaking, — this  one  of  making  a  story 
of  the  six  most  debated  years  in  the  reign 
of  the  most  debated  woman  in  history. 

It  was  prefaced  by  words  equally  as  bold.  At 
one  sweep,  Mr.  Hewlett  waved  away  all  those 
others  wh,o  had  attempted  to  make  Mary  live 
again,,  saying  that  they  had  missed  the  key 
to  her  mystery  by  failing  to  seek  the  feelings 
of  her  wild,  passionate  heart. 

Following  such  an  undertaking  and  such  a 
preface,  a  veritable  challenge  to  the  critical, 
nothing  could  succeed  and  satisfy  but  the 
highest  form  of  success.  The  venture  was 
justified  by  the  production  of  the  most  high- 
hearted, full-blooded,  living  book  about  Mary 
that  h,as  yet  been  written,  a  veritable  and 
authentic  masterpiece,  presenting  the  author's 
splendid  art  at  its  highest  and  best  phase  and 

ioo 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

putting  before  the  reader  an  unforgettable 
picture  of  Mary  and  the  crafty,  scheming  men 
by  whom  sh,e  was  surrounded,  deceived,  and 
destroyed. 

Mr.  Hewlett,  aside  from  his  needful  prepara- 
tion for  historical  romance,  has  always  had 
a  bias  towards  history.  So  the  work  of  delv- 
ing into  the  books  of  this  great  epoch  in 
Scotland's  past  must  have  been  peculiarly  con- 
genial. Having  read  much,  it  then  became 
necessary  for  him  to  forget  much.  It  was 
necessary  to  retain  only  the  great  essential 
facts  in  Mary's  story,  and  afterwards  to  pick 
out  such  details  as  were  needful  for  the  de- 
velopment of  a  moving,  life-history.  But 
something  even  more  than  this  was  necessary. 
It  has  been  pointed  out  recently  in  the  reviews 
of  Hardy's  criticism-compelling  "Dynasts" 
th,at  the  author  displayed  a  veritable  cosmic 
vision,  beholding  all  Europe  spread  out  before 
him  as  on  a  map,  with  its  armies  and  its 
battles  seen  as  if  they  were  the  struggles  of 
mites.  Mr.  Hewlett  has  displayed  something 
of  this  cosmic  vision — though  on  a  lesser 
scale — in  dealing  with  the  Scotland  of  Mary's 
time.  He,  too,  displays  something  of  the 
larger   irony,   the   greater   satiric   comprehen- 

ioi 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

sion  of  the  futility  and  the  pity  of  it  all.  He 
sees  these  puppets  caught  up  and  netted  by 
their  fate ;  he  sees  th,em  vainly  beating  against 
the  bars  and  dashed  to  destruction;  he  pities 
and  he  compassionates,  but  at  the  same  time 
he  is  as  clear  and  as  merciless  as  bare  truth 
itself. 

In  his  vision  all  th,e  multiform  events  of 
this  tumultuous,  stirring,  seething  six  years' 
period  fall  naturally  into  dramatic  form,  and 
with  an  art  that  conceals  th,e  effort  and  the 
intense  study  it  must  have  involved.  He  has 
pictured  the  grey  and  dour  Scotland  which 
seemed  to  Mary,  and  rightly  so,  such  a  hos- 
tile land  after  her  days  in  sunny  France;  he 
h,as  drawn  this  slip  of  a  girl  as  the  pivot 
about  whom  were  maneuvered  the  numerous 
intrigues  of  the  time.  To  the  half  savage 
nobles  she  was  the  means  by  which  th,ey 
might  secure  lands  and  grab  office;  to  the 
fierce,  hot-gospellers  she  was  an  idolatress 
who  followed  th.e  mandates  of  the  Pope  of 
Rome  and,  hence,  a  woman  who  ought  to  be 
sent  to  death  and  who,  in  the  meantime, 
should  be  assailed  from  every  pulpit  and 
thwarted  in  every  desire;  to  France,  Spain, 
and  Austria,  whither  she  looked  in  vain  for  en- 

102 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

couragement  and  support — one  Catholic  mon- 
arch appealing  to  the  monarchs  of  the  great 
Catholic  lands — she  was  a  mere  piece  in  the 
great  game  of  diplomatic  chess  they  were  play- 
ing for  wealth  and  power;  to  the  Pope  she  was 
an  instrument  that  he  might  use  in  redeeming 
Scotland  from  the  wave  of  Protestant  loyalty 
that  had  swept  over  it  under  the  compelling 
eloquence  and  power  of  John  Knox;  to  the 
English  Catholics  sh,e  was  the  rose  of  their 
hope  and,  byt  that  same  token,  rendered  the 
object  of  Elizabeth's  bitterest  thoughts  and 
of  her  crudest  vengeance;  while  to  Moray, 
who  looked  through  his  fingers  at  every  crime 
committed  in  his  interests,  she  was  the  one 
person  who  served  as  a  bar  to  the  sinister 
ambitions  of  a  bastard  who  coveted  a  throne. 
Mr.  Hewlett  in  telling  this  story  has  ex- 
tenuated nothing,  nor  set  down  aught  in 
malice.  It  is  small  wonder,  however,  that  he 
has  been  moved  to  pity.  Everyone,  not  a 
savage  bigot,  is  drawn  to  a  lass  who  finds 
herself  with  no  trusty  friends  in  a  land  where 
the  priests  of  her  religion  are  pelted  with,  eggs, 
whose  chaplains  are  bullied  and  stoned  in  the 
streets,  whose  rites  are  ridiculed.  Mr.  Hew- 
lett's pity  leads  him  to   maintain  that   with 

103 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

different  surroundings  and  under  different  cir- 
cumstances, the  girl  might  h,ave  been  devel- 
oped into  a  better  woman  and  Queen.  He 
does  not  make  the  mistake  of  partisanship. 
He  seeks  to  show  Mary's  character  in  the 
light  of  truth.  His  is  not  the  Mary  of  Al- 
fieri,,  nor  of  Sch,iHer,  nor  Scott,  nor  Swinburne. 
To  Alfieri,  an  Italian  and  a  Catholic,  Mary 
makes  her  appeal  as  a  Catholic  martyr  and 
Queen.  His  Mary  is  typical  of  the  productions 
of  dramatists  and  novelists  in  Catholic  coun- 
tries. It  is  their  conception  of  the  ideal  Catho- 
lic Queen,  a  martyr  to  her  faith,. 

Sir  Walter  Scott,  on  the  other  hand,  in  his 
"Abbot"  presents  a  portrait  to  be  expected 
from  a  chivalrous  gentleman  and  patriotic 
Scotchman.  His  Mary  is  a  pathetic  figure  of 
romance,  more  sinned  against  than  sinning. 

In  Schiller's  drama,  too,  the  pathetic  side, 
the  pitiful  aspect  of  Mary  is  likewise  pre- 
sented. 

Swinburne,  on  the  other  hand,  paints  a 
heartless,  pitiless,  corrupt  wretch,  a  Gothic 
Venus,  feeding  on  the  blood  of  her  lovers,  a 
harlot-hearted  creature  who  clips  and  kisses 
Chatelard  even  when  she  is  planning  his  death ; 
who  is  in  love  with  Bothwell  even  before  the 


104 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

murder  of  Riccio  and  Darnley.  Swinburne 
accepts  as  practically  true  the  accusations 
made  by  Knox  and  Buchanan,  the  confession 
of  French  Paris,  the  revelations  of  the  casket 
letters  and  sonnets.  In  no  manner  does  he 
give  Mary  the  benefit  of  any  doubt.  His  huge 
plays  constitute  a  romance  written  in  dramat- 
ic verse,  but  marred  by  bias  and  often  by 
long  rhetorical  passages,  although  in  such 
scenes  as  Knox's  denunciation  of  Mary  and 
in  the  death  scene  of  Darnley  he  attains  a 
height  of  dramatic  verse  not  often  equalled 
in  the  igth  century. 

To  Scott  the  tragedy  of  Mary's  career  was 
her  loss  of  the  throne. 

To  Swinburne,  it  was  the  loss  of  her  lover. 

To  Mr.  Hewlett,  and  therein  lies  his  truest 
inspiration,  the  tragedy  consisted  in  the 
breaking  of  the  queen's  heart.  Loss  of  a 
throne,  of  friends,  of  a  lover  were  as  nothing 
to  this.  So  long  as  her  heart  maintained  its 
dauntless  Stuart  courage,  so  long  as  she  was 
self-reliant,  brave,  and  high-spirited,  she  could 
face  the  world.  Once  her  heart  was  broken, 
however,  her  world  crumbled  beneath  her  feet 
and  she  crept  away  a  pitiful,  beaten,  broken 
thing  to  whom  death  were  welcome. 

105 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

Swinburne  has  insisted  upon  the  fact  tl\at 
Mary,  even  in  her  girlhood,  was  not  innocent. 
He  has  dwelt  upon  the  fact  that  the  French 
court  of  the  Medicis  was  a  wicked,  corrupt 
place  and  that  th,ose,  who  attended  it  and 
dwelt  in  it,  were  perforce  acquainted  with 
wickedness,   even   when   not   evil   themselves. 

Mr.  Hewlett  has  displayed  true  artistry  by 
insisting  upon  the  essential  girlishness  of 
Mary,  upon  her  initial  innocence.  There  are 
too  many  portraits  drawn  of  her  as  the  woman 
with,  stage  tragedy-queen  airs,  rather  than 
as  the  young  girl,  placed  in  exalted  station, 
petted  and  spoiled,  in  love  with  brightness, 
gaiety  and  song;  half  French  in  blood  and 
wholly  French  in  temperament. 

The  chilling  influence  of  the  Scotland  of 
the  Renaissance  period  wh,en  Knox  flourished 
is  skillfully  shown  by  Mr.  Hewlett. 

"The  Queen's  Quair"  gives  the  atmosphere 
of  Scotland.  The  book  is  filled  with  it.  It 
colours  the  scenes.  It  colours  his  very  style 
itself.  In  the  second  chapter  of  th,e  first  book 
the  Scottish  atmosphere  is,  as  it  were,  the 
protagonist.  The  reader  perceives  how  this 
grey  Scotland  with  its  fogs,  its  chills, 
its    people    so    quietly    and    keenly    watch- 

106 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

ing  Mary,  scrutinizing  the  fine  manners  of 
her  French  gallants  and  yelling  objurgations 
at  her  French  priests,  made  her  long  for 
France.  This  young  girl  loves  love,  she  loves 
smiles,  she  loves  plaudits.  She  dresses  in  her 
prettiest,  poses  h,er  most  picturesque,  and 
then  some  point  at  her,  some  shake  their 
heads,  none  salutes  her.  They  stare!  "There 
is  no  love  here,"  says  the  chilled  lass.  She 
laughs  only  twice  from  the  time  she  lands  on 
Leith  shore  until  she  rides  into  Holyrood- 
house. 

The  feuds  between  the  Hamiltons,  the  Len- 
noxes and  the  Hepburns,  the  dominating  in- 
fluence of  Knox,  the  hatred  of  popery  and 
foreign  finery  are  indicated.  All  the  tragedy 
to  come  is  felt  in  th,is  chapter  as  inevitably 
as  the  doom  of  mortals  is  felt  and  fore- 
shadowed, in  Greek  drama.  And  she  so  young 
to  be  so  doomed!  Look  at  her  as  Mr.  Hew- 
lett has  painted  her  in  that  enchanting  way 
he  has  when  painting  women: 

"A  tall,  slim  girl,  petted  and  pettish  pale 
(yet  not  unwholesome),  chestnut-haired,  she 
looked  like  a  flower  of  the  heat,  lax  and  deli- 
cate. Her  skin — but  more,  the  very  flesh  of 
her — seemed    transparent,    with    colour    that 

107 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

warmed  it  from  within,  faintly,  with  a  glow 
of  fine  rose.  *  *  *  The  Cardinal,  who  was  no 
rhapsodist  of  the  sort,  admitted  her  clear  skin, 
admitted  her  patent  royalty,  but  denied  that 
she  was  a  beautiful  girl — even  for  a  queen. 
Her  nose,  he  judged,  was  too  long,  her  lips 
were  too  thin,  her  eyes  too  narrow.  He  de- 
tested h,er  trick  of  the  sidelong  look.  Her 
lower  lids  were  nearly  straight,  her  upper 
rather  heavy;  between  them  they  gave  her  a 
sleepy  appearance,  sometimes  a  sly  appear- 
ance, when,  slowly  lifting,  they  revealed  the 
glimmering  hazel  of  the  eyes  themselves. 
Hazel,  I  say,  if  hazel  they  were,  which  some- 
times seemed  to  be  yellow,  and  sometimes 
showed  all  black;  the  light  acted  upon  hers 
as  upon  a  cat's  eyes.  Beautiful  she  may  not 
have  beenT  though  Monsieur  Brantome  would 
never  allow  it ;  but  fine,  fine  she  was  all  over — 
sharply,  exquisitely  cut  and  .modelled;  her 
sweet,  smooth  chin,  her  amorous  lips,  bright 
red  where  all  else  was  pale  as  a  tinged  rose; 
her  sensitive  nose;  her  broad,  high  brows; 
her  neck  which  two  hands  could  hold,  her 
small  shoulders,  and  bosom  of  a  child.  And 
then  her  hands,  her  waist  no  bigger  than  a 
stalk,  her  little  feet !" 

1 08 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

Such  the  girl  whose  beauty  was  to  be 
marred  by  salt  tears,  whose  boldness  was  to 
be  crushed  out  of  her,  whose  high,  courage 
was  to  avail  her  naught,  who  was  to  be  the 
wife  of  a  sodden  fool  and  awake  too  soon  to 
a  complete  knowledge  of  his  folly,  only  to  be 
the  leman  of  a  swashbuckling  Hepburn  and 
learn  too  late  th,at  she  had  thrown  away  every- 
thing in  the  world  and  received  nothing  in  re- 
turn. 

"Richard"  failed  as  a  chronicle  novel  be- 
cause of  its  divided  purpose  and  its  divided 
story.  "The  Queen's  Quair"  succeeds  where 
"Richard"  fails.  There  is  in  the  bigger  book 
no  divided  purpose.  Mr.  Hewlett  has  kept 
h,is  eye  on  the  one  main  point  throughout, — 
a  depiction  of  the  gradual  change  in  Mary's 
character;  how  it  hardened;  how  she  was  on 
a  continuous  quest  for  a  lover  who  would  be 
absolutely  true  to  her  and  at  the  same  time 
be  her  master  in  all  things;  and  how  she 
broke  her  heart  over  the  disappointment  of 
it. 

The  book  is,  indeed,  as  Mr.  Hewlett  him- 
self called  it,  a  "tragic  essay."  From  first  to 
last,  Mary  is  in  the  foreground.  It  is  her 
thoughts,  her  actions,  her  impulses,  her  emo- 

109 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

tions,  her  sayings,  her  sufferings  with  which 
he  is  concerned.  If  a  chronicle  novel  is  ever 
to  be  a  success,  this  is  it.  Real  history  is  in 
it.  Th,e  real  woman  is  in  it.  Real  life  is  in 
it.  If  the  reader  does  not  know  Mary  after 
studying  this  book,  he  will  never  know  her. 
There  is  nothing  of  importance  omitted  that 
the  dry-as-dust  historians  have  told  us.  There 
is  much,  added  that  they  have  not  presented, 
because  it  could  come  only  from  the  direct 
inventive  inspiration  allowed  to  the  novelist 
and  the  poet.  Mr.  Hewlett  has  been  so  care- 
ful as  to  his  facts  and  so  wonderfully  success- 
ful in  his  inventions  that  he  has  presented  a 
veritable  human  document.  The  novel  fol- 
lows th,e  actual  historical  sequence  and  thus, 
in  the  main,  presents  a  plot  unrivalled  by  the 
invention  of  all  but  the  supremest  minds  of 
the  ages,  wh,ile  its  series  of  dramatic  situations 
are  such  as  to  call  forth  all  the  powers  of  the 
novelist  in  the  depiction  of  the  pitiful  and  th,e 
terrible,  as  well  as  the  beautiful  and  the  pas- 
sionate. That  is  why  this  novel  is  so  much 
truer  than  history  books.  History  tells  that 
certain  men  lived  at  certain  times  and  per- 
formed certain  deeds,  glorious  or  despicable, 
as  th,e  case  may  be.    History  tells  why  kings 

no 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

went  to  war  and  why  kings  were  deposed. 
It  tells  something  of  the  state  of  the  people 
during  the  various  events  of  which  it  treats. 
The  reader  may  see  some  distance  inside  an 
era,  but  not  inside  the  minds  and  hearts  of  the 
great  actors  in  the  comedies  and  tragedies  of 
history.  And  that  is  where  Dumas'  boast 
about  the  functions  of  the  historical  novelist 
is  noteworthy.  For  the  historical  novelist, 
when  he  does  present  a  great  piece  of  work, 
throws  a  search-light  into  the  human  heart. 
In  this  chronicle  novel  by  Mr.  Hewlett,  with 
its  very  decided  psychologica  1  tendencies, 
there  is  shown  not  only  the  heart  of  Mary, 
but  the  base  ones  of  the  knaves  and  traitors 
who  ruined  her  life  and  career.  It  is  made 
clear  that  her  so-called  intellectuality  con- 
sisted in  her  girlish  love  of  French  songs,  her 
Guisian  passion  for  intrigue,  and  her  Gallic 
wit,  ready  for  most  occasions,  save  when 
pitted  against  her  dour  Scotchmen.  At  the 
great  crises  of  her  life,  it  was  not  her  intel- 
lectual processes  that  formed  the  main-springs 
of  her  actions.  Personal  passions — violent 
loves  and  hates,  likes  and  dislikes — these  were 
the  things  that  moved  her  to  take  the  steps 
that  were  ultimately  to  lead  her  to  ruin.    The 

in 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

very  things  that  made  her  appealing  as  a 
woman  made  her  unsuccessful  as  a  monarch. 
Mr.  Hewlett  does  not  seek  to  extenuate  h,er 
part  in  the  murder  of  Darnley,  nor  her  guilty 
passion  for  Bothwell.  He  depicts  her  as  she 
in  all  probability  was, — a  bewildering,  puzzling 
mixture  of  good  and  evil,  of  girlish  charm  and 
boyish  bravado,  of  frankness  and  falsity,  by 
turns  loving  and  hating,  fascinating  and  re- 
pelling, laughing  and  weeping;  now,  for  poli- 
cy's sake,  pardoning  her  sworn  enemies,  now 
making  savage  promises  of  the  terrible  ven- 
geance she  would  wreak  on  their  heads.  And 
despite  all  this,  Mr.  Hewlett,  without  the 
slightest  hint  of  favouritism  or  partisanship, 
manages  to  convey  the  belief  that  if  Darnley 
had  been  a  red-blooded  man  instead  of  a 
whimpering  fool,  or  if  Bothwell  had  been  her 
husband  instead  of  Darnley,  and  had  treated 
her  well,  there  would  have  been  a  better  Mary 
and  a  happier  Scotland.  He  has  shown  how 
largely  she  was  doomed  to  her  fate;  how  her 
own  training,  how  the  Scotland  of  her  era, 
and  the  men  who  dominated  it,  all  tended  to 
make  her  what  she  was.  Every  event  depicted 
in  the  book  works  to  that  end.  Every  inci- 
dent shows  how  some  of  the  sweetness  was 

112 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

sapped  out  of  her;  how  she  began  to  meet 
treachery  with  treachery;  how  sh,e  plotted  to 
foil  the  plotters ;  how  she  used  those  who 
would  make  her  their  instrument;  how  she, 
who  was  distrusted,  began  to  suspect  all 
around  her,  save  a  few  women  and  some  boys 
and  girls, — until  she  made  the  fatal  mistake 
of  trusting  Bothwell. 

Six  years  wrought  great  differences  in  her. 
She  was  no  longer  self-reliant,  the  boy  had 
disappeared  from  her  nature,  and  she  was  all 
weak  woman,  the  kind  of  woman  who  is  meek 
in  love's  service,  who  places  herself  at  the 
feet  of  the  loved  one,  and  is  humble  and 
timid  and  clinging  in  all  the  ways  th,at  woman 
can  humble  herself  and  cling.  The  picture  of 
the  queen  uncrowned  of  her  womanhood  by 
desire  long  denied  is  not  a  pretty  one.  It  is 
almost  pathologic  in  its  minuteness,  in  its  ter- 
rible, scientific  intensity. 

Swinburne  in  "Bothwell"  has  given  a 
glimpse  of  this  period.  Even  Schiller  places 
in  th,e  mouth  of  Hannah  Kennedy,  many  years 
afterward,  a  reminiscence  of  that  unhappy  and 
unhealthy  time. 

Mr.  Hewlett,  steadfast  to  truth,  depicts 
Mary,  the  queen  all  unqueenly,  the  woman  all 

113 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

unwomanly,  a  thing  only  of  fevered,  tortured 
desire, — hectic,  animal,  repugnant. 

He  believes  as  deeply  as  did  the  people  of 
the  Renaissance  in  the  overmastering  power 
and  the  important  place  of  passion  and  desire. 

Hear  him,  for  a  moment,  on  this  point.  It 
applies  not  only  to  this  book,  but  to  the  "Little 
Novels,"  to  "Richard"  and  to  "New  Canter- 
bury Tales,"  to  all  of  which  critics  have  made 
objections  because  of  certain  passages: 

"As  to  the  Flesh :  we  are  clothed  in  it,  don't 
want  to  be  without  it,  and  cannot  continue  in 
life  divested  of  it.  I  profess  to  deal  with 
life,  and  do  not  see  why  I  should  shrink  from 
speaking  of  it  as  it  was,  is,  and  will  always 
be.  The  characters  in  my  novels  are  men  and 
women,  and  when  I  see  them  doing  things 
which  men  and  women  do — kissing  and  mat- 
ing, as  well  as  praying  and  fighting,  I  say  so 
and  make  no  bones.  I  have  never  in  my  life 
been  suggestive  for  the  sake  of  lust,  and  never 
prurient.  But  I  do  not  see  why  I  should 
leave  out  one  half  of  life,  when  I  am  writing 
for  men  and  women  who  are  alive." 

There  is  no  passage  in  Mr.  Hewlett's  work 
to  which  an  honest  critic  can  make  objections 
on  the  score  of  fleshliness  for  its  own  sake. 

H4 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

The  so-called  fleshy  episodes  are  all  necessary 
parts  of  the  stories  in  which  they  occur.     So 
here  in  Mary's  book,  these  passages,  painful 
though  they  may  be  in  many  ways,  are  neces- 
sary to  a  comprehension  of  Mary's  relations 
with  Botrrwell,  are  necessary  above  all  to  a 
fitting  comprehension  of  that  wonderful  chap- 
ter, "The  Bride's  Prelude."     They  are  neces- 
sary in  order  to  understand  the  full  force  of 
the  crushing  blow  which  was  dealt  Mary  when 
sh,e   finally   learned    that    she    had    given    up 
everything  for  him  whom  she  deemed  her  true 
lover  and  strong  master,  only  to  find  that  once 
more    she    had    been    tricked;    that    Bothwell 
loved    his   bonny   Jean    Gordon    and    secretly 
called  h,er  wife,  while  publicly  proclaiming  his 
passion  for  the  Queen.     So  powerful  is  Mr. 
Hewlett's  art,  so  convincing  is  his  narrative, 
that  he  leads  the  reader  to  believe  indeed,  that 
nothing  that  happens  after  this  discovery  is 
of  moment  to  Mary. 

He  has  not  made  the  mistake  of  expending 
all  his  force  of  convincement  upon  the  portrait 
of  the  Queen.  The  host  of  characters  who 
played  a  part  in  the  great  tragedy  are  limned 
with  clearness  and  distinctness. 

The  wiles  of  Lethington,  the  kingly  man- 

ii5 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

ner  of  Knox,  the  croaking  of  the  ruthless 
Ruthven,  the  craft  of  Riccio;  the  spider  plot- 
ting of  the  tall,  pale,  prim  James,  Earl  of 
Moray,  who  looked  through  his  fingers  at 
what  was  going  on  around  him;  th,e  burly 
Morton;  the  jaunty,  wilful,  laughing  Both- 
well, — these  men  are  depicted  with  no  more 
care  than  the  foppish  Chatelard,  the  roguish 
French  Paris,  the  devoted  and  loving  lad,  Des 
Essars,  Mr.  Hewlett's  own  superb  creation. 

Their  true  characters  are  flashed  out  in  a 
phrase,  as  when  French.  Paris  exclaims:  "Oh, 
Monsieur  de  Moray,  Monsieur  de  Moray!  is 
not  your  lordship  the  archetype  and  everlast- 
ing pattern  of  all  rats  that  are  and  shall  be 
in  this  world?" 

Think  of  the  sinking  ships  Moray  deserted, 
of  how  th,is  trickster  was  always  prepared 
with  an  alibi,  of  his  absence  when  Riccio  was 
murdered,  when  Darnley  was  hurled  into 
eternity,  think  of  these  things  and  the  rat- 
like character  of  the  plotter  is  made  manifest. 
Or  consider  b,ow  Darnley  is  revealed  in  a  sen- 
tence: "Those  bold  eyes  of  his  were  as  blank 
as  the  windows  of  an  empty  house."  By  such 
methods  as  these,  not  only  is  the  man's  stu- 
pidity shown,  but  all  his  other  faults — the  fool 

116 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

in  hjs  folly,  the  weakling  in  his  weakness,  the 
loose  liver  in  his  license. 

Going  outside  of  history,  the  novelist  height- 
ens the  interest  of  his  book,  increases  its  air 
of  veracity,  imposes  his  beliefs  and  inspira- 
tions upon  the  reader  by  a  method  something 
like  that  used  in  "Richard."  Only  here  it  has 
been  perfected  to  such  a  pitch  that  it  hardly 
seems  artifice.  Just  as  in  "Richard"  the  nar- 
rative was  at  times  carried  on  by  extracts 
from  Milo's  work,  so  here  in  this  novel  the 
main  source  of  information  is  the  suppositi- 
tious little  volume :  "Le  Secret  des  Secrets," 
written  by  Jean-Marie-Baptiste  Des  Essars, 
a  pale-faced  wise-looking  French  boy  whose 
history  is  sufficiently  indicated  by  this : 

"The  Sieur  Des  Essars — a  gentleman  of 
Brabant — disporting  in  La  Beauce,  accosts  a 
pretty  Disaster  (to  call  her  so)  with  a  speak- 
ing eye — " 

This  French  boy,  page  to  Bothwell,  is  bound 
over  to  the  service  of  Mary  while  sh,e  is  in 
France.  He  becomes  her  devoted  servant, 
friend,  and  lover.  He  is  supposed  to  be  in 
close  contact  with  the  Queen's  party  from 
the  day  she  sets  out  for  Scotland  until  the 
day  when  she  departs  for  Lochleven  as  a  pris- 

117 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

oner.  His  book,  half  confession,  half  diary,  is 
called  upon  constantly  for  confirmation  of  the 
story.  In  it  Mr.  Hewlett  has  not  only  imbedded 
much  historic  fact,  but  likewise  much  that  h,e 
has  imagined  of  Mary.  Not  only  is  Des  Essars 
quoted  to  show  how  th,e  foolish  Darnley  re- 
ferred to  the  "fond  queen,"  but  he  gives  an 
insight  into  the  mental  processes  of  the 
Queen,  into  the  tribulations  of  her  heart,  into 
the  passions  of  her  naked  soul.  But  Des  Es- 
sars is  not  the  only  witness.  Mr.  Hewlett 
created  him,  having  Nau  partly  in  mind.  He 
recreated  French  Paris.  The  histories  tell 
something  of  wh,at  the  rogue  said  when  put  to 
the  torture.  Mr.  Hewlett's  way  is  easier  and 
more  humane.  Cross  Paris'  palm  with  a  coin 
and  away  he  chatters  of  his  master  Bothwell 
and  of  the  Queen.  Th,e  talk  is  stamped  with 
the  mark  of  truth,  even  as  are  the  letters  Mr. 
Hewlett  has  written  for  Bothwell  and  the  ex- 
tracts from  the  diary  of  the  Master  of  Sempill. 
To  h,ave  so  absorbed  the  spirit  of  the  bygone 
age  as  to  be  able  to  reproduce  it  in  diary,  in 
letters,  in  conversation,  and  in  book  extracts, 
is  a  veritable  triumph  of  invention.  It  serves 
as   an   extension   of   known   historic   facts;   it 

118 


THE  QUEEN'S  QUAIR 

bolsters  the  novel  and  adds  to  its  clutch  upon 
credulity. 

The  author  is  said  to  have  revised  and  re- 
written the  novel  four  times.  After  a  second 
and  third  reading  of  th,e  book,  some  concep- 
tion is  gained  of  its  richness  and  weight  and 
worth,  of  the  world  of  labour  that  was  needed 
to  compress  even  within  the  limits  of  this  big 
volume  something  of  the  life  of  this  big  time. 
The  careful  student  then  begins  to  understand 
the  genuine  inspiration  that  made  these  Ren- 
aissance figures  very  much  alive,  that  filled 
their  veins,  not  with  ink,  but  with  rich,  red, 
passionate  blood.  Mr.  Hewlett's  "Quair"  is 
a  nineteenth  century  masterpiece  which  need 
fear  no  comparison  with,  the  historical  novels 
of  his  great  predecessors. 


119 


THE  ROAD  IN  TUSCANY. 


WHEN  it  was  announced  in  1904  that 
the  Hewlett  book  for  the  year  was  to 
be  a  monumental  travel  book  entitled, 
"The  Road  in  Tuscany,"  many  were  disap- 
pointed. Here  was  one  of  the  finest  writers 
of  his  day,  taking  his  papers  in  "Quarterly 
Review,"  "Speaker"  and  the  "Cornhill"  maga- 
zine and  extending  them  into  two  volumes. 

There  is  little  of  the  first,  fine,  careless, 
boyish  rapture  that  so  marked  "Earthwork;" 
there  is  nothing  approaching  "Quattrocen- 
tisteria"  or  the  studies  of  Ilaria  and  Bettina 
or  the  "Sacrifice  at  Prato."  Instead,  there  is 
a  maturer  man,  a  more  sophisticated  traveller, 
and,  likewise,  one  who  h,as  lost  some  of  his 
illusions.  However,  Mr.  Hewlett  could  still 
say  the  Tuscans  are  "the  most  alert,  charming, 
intelligent,  curious  people  in  Europe."  He 
could  still  affirm  much  of  his  old  love  in  the 
credo : — 

"This   is   the   singular   quality   of   Italy — a 

120 


THE  ROAD  IN  TUSCANY 

land  of  the  people  never  at  one  and  never  at 
rest,  always  fine  in  act,  and  always  distin- 
guished in  its  presentation — that  at  every  turn 
of  the  road,  and  at  every  revolution  of  the 
centuries,  she  is  able  to  stab  you  to  the  heart." 

But  if  there  is  indeed,  nothing  in  this  work 
that  quite  distinctly  challenges  the  contents 
of  "Earthwork"  for  quality,  there  is  yet  much 
meat  for  enjoyment.  It  does  what  he  him- 
self has  said  in  another  connection  are  the 
three  indispensables  for  a  travel  book:  "it  in- 
spires travel,  it  illuminates  travel,  and  it  re- 
calls it." 

As  always  with  Mr.  Hewlett,  the  people  of 
the  country  have  been  the  main  consideration. 
He  has  been  content  to  allow  Mr.  Murray  to 
point  out  the  glory  of  museum  after  museum; 
to  concede  to  Ruskin  the  right  of  pulpiteer; 
and  to  Mr.  Grant  Allen  the  pov.  er  of  the 
school  master.  He  has  been  willing  to  allow 
Herr  Baedeker  to  state  mere  facts  for  the 
traveller-in-a-hurry,  for  Baedeker  "saw  the 
museum,  but  I  saw  the  custode  of  it,  a  very 
noble  priest.  He  saw  the  fresco,  but  I  its 
poor  patient  proprietress.  He  saw  th,e  inn 
and  said  it  was  a  good  one.  So  it  is;  but  I 
saw  the  innkeeper's  pretty  daughter,  and  was 

121 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

witness  to  the  unuttered,  unutterable  passion 
of  the  waiter  for  her." 

In  other  words,  there  is  the  whimsical,  en- 
gaging Hewlett  for  guide  and  mentor,  in- 
stead of  the  dehumanized  cicerone,  become  a 
mere  megaphone  for  the  dreary  recital  of 
drearier  statistics  and  historical  dates.  In- 
corrigible teller  of  tales,  he  has  sturdily  main- 
tained in  this  set  of  books  that  the  way  to 
tell  the  history  of  the  towns  h,e  visited  is  not 
to  tell  it — if  the  bull  may  be  allowed.  Instead, 
he  says  he  must  get  at  the  biography  of  each 
town,  each  biography  being  a  sum  of  the  life 
stories  of  its  citizens,  of  th,e  "men  who  sat  at 
its  councils,  ruled  its  markets,  built  its 
churches,  painted  its  walls,  and  wrote  its 
little  books  and  sonnets;  yes,  and  sang  under 
its  daughter's  windows  o'  nights,  and  hoed  its 
vines  and  pruned  its  olives,  and  urged  its 
great  pale  oxen  along  its  furrows."  To  get  at 
these  things,  he  has  felt  it  necessary  to  leave 
the  beaten  path  and  take  to  the  road,  "th,e 
greatest  leveller  after  death,"  colouring  all 
alike  with  sweat  and  grime.  And  so  he  has 
taken  as  his  exemplars  in  writing  the  work, 
the  old  road  books  of  his  grandfathers'  day. 
And  with,  the  road  come  the  joys  of  it,  unflagg- 

122 


THE  ROAD  IN  TUSCANY 

ing  high  spirits,  a  constant  sense  of  the 
humourous  in  things,  a  delight  in  all  he  sees, 
an  impatience  with  the  pedants  who  wish  to 
make  the  love  of  good  pictures  over  into  an 
exclusive  cult  to  wh,ich  mere  Philistines  are 
not  to  be  admitted.  And  this  feeling  is  re- 
flected again  and  again  in  witty  or  humourous 
or  fantastic  sayings. 

It  is  precisely  these  whimsical  things, 
coupled  with  his  expressed  views  on  history, 
on  art,  and  on  literature,  together  with  his 
little  inventions  scattered  throughout  the  two 
volumes  that  make  the  work  worth  while. 
The  reader  may  never  go  to  Italy  and  may 
not  visit  Tuscan  hill  towns  if  he  does  go. 
Conceivably  h,e  may  not  be  interested  in  the 
facts  about  these  places,  but  as  a  student  of 
Mr.  Hewlett's  books,  he  is  interested  in  what 
the  author  reveals  of  himself. 

Thus  Mr.  Hewlett  once  more  proclaims  his 
love  for  Dante.  He  does  it  in  comments  that 
are  very  expressive  of  hjs  own  personality. 
Here  is  one  that  contains  just  the  quirk  of 
style,  just  the  strain  of  whimsicality,  just  the 
tang  of  character  that  anyone  who  reads  Mr. 
Hewlett's  work  is  quick  to  recognize,  but 
which  is  so  hard  to  define. 

123 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

It  affords  another  delightful  example  of  how 
informing,  how  amusing,  and  how  "contenta- 
tious"  and  creative  a  literary  critic  Mr.  Hew- 
lett would  have  been  had  he  devoted  himself 
to  such  work. 

Speaking  of  Beatrice  and  Dante :  "He 
loved  this  green-e}'ed  girl,  and,  because  he 
loved,  freed  his  immortal  part,  and  towered 
higher  than  any  of  th,e  sons  of  men.  For  if 
our  Milton  heard  God  speak,  this  man  dared 
look  Him  in  the  face,  take  his  stand  with 
Saint  John  and  Saint  James  below  the  burning 
throne  of  Heaven,  and  see  his  beloved  as- 
sumed into  the  very  heart  of  Mary.  This  it 
is  to  be  a  lover.  If  he  paid  more  than  lovers' 
honour  to  the  green-eyed  girl,  what  did  she 
not  do  for  him?  She  gave  him  strength  to 
soar,  taught  him  the  mystery  of  Beauty  and 
Desire,  'imparadised  his  mind.'  Who  she  was, 
or  what,  whether  gentle  or  simple,  maid,  wife 
or  widow,  a  beauty  or  a  scold,  tall  or  short, 
(I  myself  believe  she  was  a  little  woman),  it 
is  no  matter.  She  imparadised  his  mind.  He 
repaid  her  with  such  sort  as  no  woman,  save 
the  Queen  of  women,  has  ever  received  of  man. 
But  she  had  given  h,im  the  keys  to  Heaven. 
It  is  enough  for  us  to  be  sure  that  she  was 

124 


THE  ROAD  IN  TUSCANY 

lovely  and  good,  had  green  eyes  and  died 
young.  To  which  I  add  for  my  private  con- 
tentation — that  she  was  a  little  woman." 

Thus  Mr.  Hewlett,  wh,en  his  real  enthusi- 
asm is  aroused.  But  Dante  is  almost  the 
only  man  in  Italian  literature  who  does  it.  He 
likes  Dante  because  he  is  company  for  the 
out-of-doors-  man  as  well  as  for  the  man  who 
desires  to  ponder  in  the  library.  And  that 
leads  to  the  chief  fault  he  finds  with  the  other 
Tuscan  writers.  He  complains  that  they  tell 
him  little  of  Tuscany  and  are  not  illuminative 
of  Tuscans.  They  are  indoor  company  and 
their  books  are  library  affairs.  There  is  not 
enough  wind  and  sun  and  sky  in  their  books 
to  suit  him.  The  result  is  that  in  mentioning 
most  of  the  Italians,  whom  many  critics  have 
agreed  to  call  great,  he  plays  the  devil's  ad- 
vocate and  very  amusingly  he  plays  it  too, 
with  a  downrightness  of  opinion  that  brooks 
no  denial,  with  a  hardheaded  conviction  that 
they  are  small  men,  comparatively  speaking, 
and  so  not  worthy  much  time  and  study. 

There  is  the  same  independence  of  attitude 
in  Mr.  Hewlett  when  it  comes  to  examining 
the  great  pictures  to  be  seen  in  Italy  and  also 
when  it  comes  to  differing  with  the  art  pun- 

125 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

dits.  He  has  very  little  respect  for  the  self- 
appointed  guides.  Again  and  again,  with 
almost  a  touch  of  personal  grievance,  he  has 
his  fling  at  them, — Ruskin,  Grant  Allen,  Mr. 
Berenson.  Right  in  the  beginning  of  his 
book,  he  contemptuously  says  he  knows  the 
trend  of  modern  art  criticism  which  does  not 
concern  itself  with  the  questions:  "Did  A 
paint  this  and  was  it  worth  painting?"  but 
rather,  "Wh,o  among  all  known  or  unknown 
painters  may  have  painted  such  and  such, 
hitherto  universally  attributed  to  A?"  And 
when  it  comes  to  the  subject  of  Ghirlandajo, 
he  resents  being  called  a  superior  Philistine 
when  he  waxes  enthusiastic  over  the  work  of 
"the  most  Flemish  of  the  Florentine  painters." 
"I  do  seriously  maintain,"  he  says  in  heat, 
"th,at  pictures,  statues,  great  churches  being 
there,  are  to  be  treated  as  part  of  the  land- 
scape— like  trees  or  waterfalls;  that  they  are 
for  convenience,  not  cult;  that  they  are  ad- 
mirable for  their  use,  not  useful  for  the  ad- 
miration they  extort  from  us.  It  is  good  to 
admire,  enthusiasm  is  above  rubies;  yet  it  is 
better  to  admire  a  man  in  his  handiwork,  than 
his  handiwork  in  a  man.     Moreover — and  this 

126 


THE  ROAD  IN  TUSCANY 

is  corollary — there  is  more,  and  better  stuff 
than  dilettantism  in  every  one  of  us." 

And  so  having  demolished  art  critics  to  his 
own  satisfaction,  even  though  he  has  to  adopt 
a  few  euphuisms  to  do  it,  he  shows  the  cour- 
age of  his  convictions  by  launching  into  an 
apostrophe  which  recalls  another  of  the  mas- 
ters who  taught  Mr.  Hewlett  some  of  the 
graces  of  his  prose.  Is  there  not  the  very  echo 
of  the  gentle  Elia  in  such  as  this?  "Incom- 
parable Ghirlandajo!  Shrewdest,  most  humor- 
ous, inexh,austiblest  of  painters,  what  should 
we  know  of  the  great  world  of  Florence  with- 
out thee  and  thy  twinkling  eye?  Hast  thou 
missed  not  one?  Where  hast  thou  scrupled 
to  place  them,  in  what  august  company  of 
gods  and  demigods?  Who  are  those  frost- 
bitten acquaintances  of  our  Redeemer,  these 
hard  men  in  red  who  stand  about  while  He 
suffers  baptism  or  changes  water  into  wine 
at  Cana — who  are  they  but  Ser  Luca  and  Ser 
Cosimo,  and  other  stout  oneyers  of  the  count- 
ing-house and  Mercato  Nuovo?' 

In  these  volumes  Mr.  Hewlett  has  given 
some  of  his  thoughts  on  history,  too.  Indeed, 
he  has  written  appendices  which  are  in  them- 


127 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

selves  little  chapters  on  the  history  of  the 
various  towns,  or  rather  "nations"  as  he  prefers 
to  call  them.  He  has  always  had  a  decided 
leaning  toward  historical  study. 

He  h,as  stated  that  some  day  he  expects  to 
do  some  work  in  the  way  of  historical  writ- 
ing. In  the  appendices  in  the  volumes  under 
consideration,  Mr.  Hewlett  openly  writes  him- 
self the  pupil  of  Carlyle.  His  sentences  are 
jerky,  eccentric,  often  elliptical.  There  is 
lacking  his  usual  music  and  in  its  place  is  a 
prose  giving  th,e  very  essence  of  history,  but 
history  in  its  bare  bones. 

In  addition  to  Tuscan  art  and  literature,  he 
discusses  the  folk,  who  he  says,  are  always 
more  interesting  than  their  work.  In  ap- 
proaching this  subject,  he  has  two  methods, 
the  methods  of  the  novelist  outright,  and  of 
old   George   Borrow.     In  his    first   character, 

Mr.  Hewlett  gives  various  "Little  Novels." 
There  is,  for  instance,  the  story  of  Donna 
Berta  and  Ser  Martino.  They  are  the  typical 
Tuscan  Darby  and  Joan.  He  says  it  was  the 
magnificoes  who  blew  trumpets  and  levied 
wars,  but  it  was  its  Bertas  and  Martinos  who 
made  Florence.    And  so  he  tries  to  draw  them 

128 


THE  ROAD  IN  TUSCANY 

— the  thrifty  house-wife  ,guarding  her  hus- 
band's gear  and  presenting  him  straightlimbed 
sons  and  handsome  daughters;  and  the  indus- 
trious husband,  advancing  step  by  step  to 
higher  honours  in  the  service  of  his  Florence. 

It  was  Borrow  who  showed  that  romance 
was  not  dead;  that  one  did  not  have  to  fare 
far  afield  for  it;  that  one  could  take  the  road 
in  any  country,  and  every  bend  in  the  long, 
winding,  white  way  would  bring  its  little 
comedy  or  tragedy. 

Mr.  Hewlett  found  this  to  be  true.  Let 
Borrow  have  his  wonderful  gipsies  mingling 
the  poetry  of  th,e  good  brown  earth  with  canny 
talk  of  horses  and  pugilism.  He  has  certainly 
given  no  more  solid  amusement  than  the  read- 
er derives  from  Mr.  Hewlett's  advance  down 
the  road  to  Pistoja.  The  latter  found  himself 
jostling  with  a  sharp-faced,  bristle-bearded 
countryman,  carrying  tools  and  a  wickered 
flask  of  wine.  The  younger  Borrow  falls  into 
talk  with  him.  He  learns  that  the  people  are 
pouring  into  the  city  to  do  honour  to  the 
relics  of  San  Atto,  the  Bishop.  Whereupon 
the  Englishman  gives  his  sad  reflections  to  the 
brother  of  tb,e   road.     They  do  these   things 

129 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

better  in  Italy.  There  is  more  reverence  and 
more  honesty  in  the  reverence. 

The  Englishman  is  curious  as  to  his  com- 
panion's name.  Of  all  the  names  in  the  world 
it  is  Gino  Cancellieri!  Whereupon  Mr.  Hew- 
lett, having  duly  had  a  meditation  about  the 
history  of  Pistoja  and  its  rulers,  begins: 

"  'Your  forefather,  my  dear  sir,'  I  ended, 
'was  tyrant  of  Pistoja.' 

"The  last  of  the  Cancellieri  took  this  at 
first  with  great  phlegm.' 

"  'He  may  have  been,  for  all  I  know,'  he 
said;  'but  my  own  father  was  a  road-mender, 
and  broke  stones  betwixt  Piastre  and  Cireglio. 
He  was  famous  for  it.  You  have  been  walk- 
ing on  his  metal  this  morning,  I  doubt,  and 
permit  me  to  say  there  is  no  better.  Tyrant 
of  Pistoja  was  he?  Well,  there's  a  trade  for  a 
man!'  The  humour  of  it  now  tickling  him, 
he  laughed  gaily.  I  said  that  I  considered  it  a 
less  reputable  trade  th,an  road-mending;  but 
Cancellieri  would  have  his  laugh  out  now  that 
he  had  caught  it. 

"'Why,  it  may  be  so,'  he  allowed,  'I  don't 
care  to  dispute  it.  But  what  gravels  me  is 
th,e  justice  of  it.    My  grandfather,  as  you  may 

130 


THE  ROAD  IN  TUSCANY 

say,  walked  soft-footed  upon  the  sweat  of 
the  Pistolesi  ,  and  here  are  the  Pistolesi  doing 
the  same  by  my  father.  Well,  that's  as  good 
as  a  comedy  any  day.'  " 

There  is  no  better  place  to  stop  than  this. 
It  is  a  charming  episode  charmingly  told. 


131 


THE  BRAZENHEAD  CYCLUS. 


SOME  day  there  is  to  be  a  complete 
Brazenhead  cyclus.  Mr.  Hewlett  him- 
self has  promised  it.  There  is  a  view  of 
the  redoubtable  Captain  in  a  story  of  Italy  by 
him  in  the  "New  Canterbury  Tales."  In  "Fond 
Adventures"  there  is  the  complete  history  of 
how  he  came  to  join  the  pilgrimage  of  the 
Prioress  of  Ambresbury;  of  his  relations  with 
all  the  persons  mentioned  in  the  "New  Canter- 
bury Tales ;"  of  his  services  in  Jack  Cade's  war; 
and,  finally,  of  how  he  rendered  certain  as- 
sistance to  Percival  Perceforest,  who  becom- 
ing Lord  Say,  made  the  war-worn  Captain, 
"Steward  of  the  Manors  of  Westerham,  Knock- 
holt  and  Froghole  with,  a  reversion  of  the 
Office  of  High  Bailiff  of  the  Lordship  of 
Sevenoaks." 

In  "The  Countess  of  Picpus,"  published  in 
Putnam's  Monthly  Magazine  in  April,  May, 
and  June,  1907  there  is  an  earlier  adventure 
of  Brazenhead  when  England  and  Burgundy 

132 


THE  BRAZENHEAD  CYCLUS 

were  allied  against  France;  an  adventure  in 
Provence,  where  Brazenhead  masqueraded  as 
the  Count  of  Picpus,  rendered  a  service  to  a 
nobleman  and  a  lady  in  distress,  and  inciden- 
tally won  for  himself  a  mistress,  proving  the 
truth  of  an  old  rhyme  of  Boccacio's  that  there 
is  kissing  yet  in  a  kissed  mouth.  In  the  very 
last  paragraph  of  this  story  there  is  a  promise 
of  still  others: 

"I  am  learning  it  by  staves  at  a  time;  it  is 
but  a  portion  of  the  great  Brazenhead  cyclus; 
and  some  day " 

In  a  letter  concerning  him  there  is  a  similar 
promise : 

"Brazenhead  is  a  standby.  I  keep  him  until 
I  want  him,  and  have  a  look  at  him  now  and 
then." 

It  is  for  these  reasons  that  this  chapter  is 
adorned  by  Brazenhead's  name  rather  than 
by  the  title  of  the  next  volume  by  Mr.  Hewlett 
in  the  order  of  its  publication, — "Fond  Ad- 
ventures." 

It  is  not  hard  to  see  that  Brazenhead  is  a 
prime  favorite  with  Hewlett.  Upon  his  name, 
as  a  peg,  are  ultimately  to  be  hung  many 
stories  that  have  occurred  to  Mr.  Hewlett 
during  his  study  of  the   15th  century  period 

133 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

when  England,  France,  and  Italy  afforded  so 
much   chance   for   romantic   or   ridiculous   or 
picaresque    adventure.      Brazenhead,    himself, 
is    at    once    romantic,    ridiculous,    and    picar- 
esque.    A  swashbuckler  who  will  really  fight, 
a    poet    without    letters,    a    user    of    foreign 
phrases  without  much  knowledge   of  foreign 
tongues,  a  bombastic  liar  who  delights  in  mas- 
querades, he  is  a  lineal  descendant  of  those 
great    figures    in    literature, — Falstaff,    Bom- 
bastes    Furioso,    Tartarin,    Cyrano    and    the 
swashbucklers  of  Dumas.    Mr.  Hewlett  takes 
something  from  each,  of  these.     He  adds  to  it 
characteristics  culled  from  old  chronicles,  or 
created  by  his  own  fancy.     Brazenhead  is  a 
plaything  of  Mr.  Hewlett's.     The  author  de- 
lights in  him,  pokes  fun  at  h,im,  burlesques 
him.    He  cannot  rest  with  simple  descriptions 
of  him.    He  must  needs  caricature  him  out  of 
sheer  high  animal  spirits.    Some  day,  mayhap, 
Mr.  Hewlett  will  come  to  love  h,im,  will  begin 
to  approach  him  in  graver  and  tenderer  mood. 
It  is  difficult  to  know  where  to  begin  to  des- 
cribe  this   "free    routier."     Captain   Salamon 
Brazenhead,    late    of    Burgundy,    formerly   of 
Milan  is  a  "lean  man  of  six  feet  two  inches, 
of  inordinate  thirst,  of  two  scars  on  his  face, 

134 


THE  BRAZENHEAD  CYCLUS 

a  notched  forefinger,  a  majestic  nose,  of  a  long 
sword,  two  daggers  and  a  stolen  horse,  of  ex- 
perience in  various  kinds  of  villainy,  yet  of 
simple  tastes." 

Here  is  the  description  of  a  nose  that  marks 
the  possessor  as  own  cousin  to  Cyrano: 

"I  prefer  a  paean  on  his  nose,  a  trumpet,  an 
ensign  built  on  imperial  lines:  broad-rooted, 
full  of  gristle,  ridged  with  sharp  bone,  abound- 
ing in  callus,  tapering  exquisitely  to  a  point, 
very  flexible  and  quick.  With  this  weapon 
of  offence  or  defiance  he  could  sneer  you  from 
manhood's  portly  presence  to  a  line  of  shame, 
with  it  comb  h,is  mustachios.  When  he  was 
deferential  it  kissed  his  lip;  combative,  it 
cocked  his  hat.  It  was  a  nose  one  could  pat 
with  some  pretense;  scratched,  it  was  set  on 
fire,  you  could  see  it  smouldering  in  the  dusk. 
Into  the  vexed  dabate,  whether  great  noses  are 
invariable  with  great  men,  I  shall  not  enter. 
Captain  Brazenhead  was  great,  and  he  had  a 
great  nose."  That,  of  course,  is  a  cartoon  in 
words,  nothing  more,  nothing  less. 

Brazenhead  is  a  boaster.  He  tells  his  hear- 
ers that  kings  are  h,is  familiar  divinities,  dwell- 
ers upon  his  very  hearthstone.  Once  launched 
upon  a  sea  of  lies,  he  will  declare  that  he  is 

135 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

the  seventh  son  of  a  seventh  son,  will  boast 
of  ladies'  favour,  will  tell  of  quarrels  with  the 
Pope  at  Avignon.  He  will  confide  that  Sir 
John  Falstaff  was  his  friend  and  that  he  knew 
the  king  well  and  called  him  "Harry." 

In  his  talk  he  will  use  scraps  of  anecdotes, 
choice  phrases  from  various  tongues,  classical 
allusions  that  will  make  his  hearers  think  him 
learned,  until  they  see  him  adroitly  conceal- 
ing the  fact  that  he  can  not  read. 

Now  all  this  makes  h«im  the  routier  of  the 
15th  century  to  be  met  with  in  ancient  chron- 
icles, raised  to  the  Nth  power  of  caricature. 
With  one  subtle  touch,  however,  Mr.  Hewlett 
gives  a  glimpse  into  the  deeper  heart  of  th,e 
man,  of  him  who  befriends  young  lovers,  who 
strives  for  their  joy  and  masquerades  for  their 
safety.  The  magnificent  lies,  the  studied  at- 
titudes, the  strange  caperings  of  the  lean, 
hairy  soldier  are  those  of  one  who  is  a  poet  at 
heart,  who  dramatizes  himself  in  episode 
after  episode.  This  mercenary,  who  loves  the 
clink  of  gold  and  wh,o  can  give  the  greatest 
pains  to  the  conquest  of  a  serving  maid  whose 
pretty  hair  touches  his  fancy,  is  so  much  of 
a  poet  and  nature  lover  that  a  field  of  cow- 
slips sends  him  into  raptures:  "My  fresh  beau- 

136 


THE  BRAZENHEAD  CYCLUS 

ties!  My  dairy-delights,"  he  cries,  "I  would 
as  soon  trample  my  mother's  grave  as  your 
wagging  golden  heads." 

He  who  loves  flowers  with  a  poet's  and 
child's  clean  delight  is  something  more  than 
a  cartoon  routier  of  the  Middle  Ages.  Some 
day,  wh,en  age  has  burned  some  of  the  lust 
out  of  him,  when  his  blood  has  cooled,  when 
his  brain  is  less  inventive  of  bombastic  fictions, 
the  inner  core  of  Salamon  will  be  revealed 
There  are  stories  of  love  and  war  in  his  career, 
one  may  be  sure.  And  when  th,e  picture  is 
complete,  when  the  last  chapter  has  been 
written,  it  will  be  discovered  that  the  cartoon 
man  has  a  heart,  that  h,e  has  something  more 
than  a  figure  at  whose  contemplation  "fat 
laughter  holds  his  sides." 

"Fond  Adventures"  contained  in  addition  to 
the  tale  about  Brazenhead,  three  other  stories. 
"The  Heart's  Key,"  a  tale  of  troubadour 
France,  and  "Buondelmonte's  Saga"  and  "The 
Love  Chase,"  two  more  little  novels  of  Italy. 
"The  Heart's  Key"  is  a  light  thing  in  Mr.  Hew- 
lett's romantic  vein. 

"The  Love  Chase"  is  a  little  comedy  which 
goes   dangerously   near   to   tragedy.      It   is   a 

137 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

saga  of  Renaissance  Italian  poets,  condo- 
tierri,  and  great  churchmen, — in  their  pursuit 
of  one  who  "is  rather  young,  very  pale  and 
who  partakes  of  the  nature  of  a  dove." 

After  all,  however,  "Fond  Adventures" 
marked  no  new  achievement  by  its  author; 
and  represented  him  in  no  new  line  of  work. 


138 


THE   FOOL  ERRANT. 


IN  "The  Fool  Errant"  the  author  bids  good- 
by  not  only  to  the  old  times  of  the  Renais- 
sance, but  also  to  much  of  the  former 
Hewlett  manner.  The  novel  is  a  story  of  18th 
century  Italy,  filled  with  the  tone  and  colour 
of  that  period. 

It  is  not  a  little  singular  that  in  commenting 
upon  the  probable  inspirations  of  the  book, 
none  of  the  commentators  mentioned  Beyle. 
Mr.  Richard  Holbrook,  writing  in  the  Book- 
man in  1906  on  "Some  probable  sources  of 
Mr.  Hewlett's  Fool  Errant"  laid  especial 
stress  upon  "Don  Quixote."  He  saw  in  the 
hero  another  Don;  he  saw  in  Aurelia  another 
Dulcinea,  idealized  in  the  brain  of  the  wor- 
shipper; he  saw  in  the  little  peasant  Virginia 
another  Sancho  Panza. 

Still  another  saw  in  Strelley  of  Upcote  a 
Joseph  Andrews  at  large  in  18th  century  Italy, 
instead  of  18th  century  England.  None  of  the 
critics  seemingly  remembered  that  some  years 
ago  Mr.  Hewlett  wrote  an  eloquent  and  en- 

139 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

thusiastic  introduction  to  a  new  English, 
translation  of  Beyle's  "La  Chartreuse  de 
Parme,"  in  which  he  declared  it  as  his  sober 
belief  that  this  novel  was  the  greatest  France 
had  produced.  It  is  in  this  introduction  that 
he  speaks  of  the  hero  Fabrice  as  a  "divine 
Italian  fool  salted  over  with  French  wit." 
Copying  this,  one  might  say  that  Strelley  is 
a  divine  fool,  guided  and  protected  by  a  dewy 
innocence  almost  proof  against  worldliness. 
It  is  no  reflection  upon  Mr.  Hewlett's  art  to 
surmise  that  something  of  Cervantes,  some- 
thing of  Fielding,  and  something  of  Beyle  was 
in  his  mind  when  he  conceived  this  story. 

If  you  take  an  "innocent  abroad"  like  Joseph 
Andrews,  endow  him  with  the  dreams  of  th,e 
Don,  and  set  him  atilt  against  the  Italy 
Beyle  loved,  you  will  have  something  of  which 
"The  Fool  Errant,"  is  all  compact.  Only 
something,  however.  For  to  the  compound 
you  must  add  Mr.  Hewlett's  romanticism,  his 
own  unique  way  of  saying  things,  his  own 
peculiar  conception  of  woman.  In  comparing 
the  hero  of  "The  Fool  Errant"  with  the  heroes 
of  the  three  acknowledged  masterpieces,  it  is 
well  to  remember  the  attitudes  the  various 
creators  adopted  toward  their  creations. 

140 


THE  FOOL  ERRANT 

Cervantes  began  by  poking  fun  at  his  Don 
and  ended  by  loving  him. 

Fielding  began  and  ended  by  laughing  at 
his  Joseph. 

Beyle,  the  dry  psychologist,  throughout 
maintained  the  tone  of  the  scientific  demon- 
strator who  aimed  only  at  getting  at  the  truth 
without  palliation  and  without  suppression. 

Mr.  Hewlett,  different  from  all  of  them, 
begins  and  ends  by  loving  his  fool.  He  laughs 
at  him  sometimes,  but  the  tears  are  never  far 
away. 

In  some  respects,  it  would  be  easy  to  com- 
pare Mr.  Hewlett  with  Beyle,  whom  he  ad- 
mires so  enthusiastically. 

Psychological  phenomena  absorbed  the  at- 
tention of  Beyle.  It  has  been  said  that  "as 
the  observant  traveller,  as  the  student  of  old 
chronicles,  as  the  author  of  novels  and  stories, 
he  was  a  psychologist  and  that  alone." 

This  is  becoming  increasingly  true  of  Mr. 
Hewlett.  He  began  by  confining  himself  to 
tale-telling.  He  has  advanced  in  "Richard" 
and  "Queen's  Quair"  and  in  "The  Fool  Er- 
rant" to  the  ranks  of  those  authors  who  are 
also  engrossed  with  psychological  phenome- 
na. 

141 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

With  Beyle,  there  were  two  passions,  the 
love  of  war  and  th,e  love  of  women.  This  is 
true  of  Mr.  Hewlett  in  his  books.  Both  of 
them  love  Italy  and  its  women  and  its  life 
in  the  15th  and  16th  centuries. 

But  there  is  also  a  contrast  between  the 
greater  man  and  this  author.  Beyle  never 
wrote  a  line  of  poetry  and  had  no  ear  for 
rhythm. 

Mr.  Hewlett  not  only  writes  poetry, 
but  approaches  all  his  studies  as  does  a  poet 
and  in  his  methods  of  composition  trusts,  like 
the  poet,  to  that  divine  fury  which  is  called 
inspiration.  Having  stuffed  himself  full  of 
a  subject,  h,e  then  pours  out  his  broodings  and 
imaginings.  Beyle  has  the  dry  manner  of  the 
Code  Civile,  the  matter-of-fact  manner  of  the 
scientific  investigator.  Mr.  Hewlett  is  carried 
away  on  the  wings  of  his  imagination,  his 
style  takes  colour  from  its  subject,  sombre  in 
tragedy,  lightsome  in  comedy.  He  appeals 
both  to  the  eye  and  th,e  ear.  Beyle  appealed 
to  neither. 

Mr.  Hewlett  is  intensely  personal  in  his  at- 
titude in  his  stories.  Beyle  is  quite  the  re- 
verse. 

George    Brandes    says    that    Beyle's   books 

142 


THE  FOOL  ERRANT 

contain  "the  purely  extrinsic  Romanticism  of 
their  day  in  the  shape  of  disguises,  poison- 
ings, and  assassinations,  prison  and  flight 
scenes,  etc." 

It  was  the  memory  of  some  of  these  ex- 
ternals of  romanticism,  perhaps,  that  in- 
fluenced Mr.  Hewlett  to  employ  similar  epi- 
sodes in  "The  Fool  Errant."  Indeed,  substi- 
tute "The  Fool  Errant"  for  "La  Chartreuse" 
and  Mr.  Hewlett  can  be  allowed  to  describe 
the  Italy  of  his  own  book  as  well  as  that  of 
Beyle : 

"  'La  Chartreuse'  depicts  the  Italy  of  the 
18th  century,  the  Italy  of  faded  simulacra,  of 
fard  and  hair  powder,  of  cicisbei  and  curled 
abbati,  of  petits-maitres,  of  the  Grand  Dukes 
of  Tuscany,  of  Luca  Longhi.  For  the  come- 
dian of  manners  this  is  the  time  of  times,  since 
manners  seemed  all,  and  Italy  the  place  of 
places  where  manners  h,ave  always  been  more 
than  all.  There  was  matter  for  a  Moliere, 
matter  for  a  Hogarth  (and  Longhi  took  of 
each) ;  but  there  was  something  over.  De 
Stendhal  bringing  the  wit  of  one  and  the  irony 
of  th,e  other  up  to  be  fed,  brought  also  that 
something  over  which  neither  of  these  had — • 
dauntless  appetite  for  romance,  the  arbitrary 

H3 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

dealing — cet  air  de  maitrise  et  ce  beau  non- 
chaloir — of  his  own  genius." 

It  is  in  this  particular  Italy  that  Hewlett 
places  a  story  that  is  at  once  a  comedy  of 
manners,  a  picaresque  romance,  and  a  splen- 
did study  of  character.  It  is  a  comedy  of 
manners  in  that  it  shows  the  complications 
which  grow  out  of  the  actions  of  the  innocent 
Englishman  set  in  contact  with  a  people 
whpm  he  does  not  understand.  It  is  picar- 
esque in  that  it  is  an  Odyssey  of  Strelley's 
wandering  from  Padua  to  Rovigo,  from  Rovi- 
go  to  Bologna,  from  Bologna  to  Pistoja, — in 
fact  throughout  all  the  Tuscan  lands  that  Mr. 
Hewlett  loves  so  well.  It  is  a  tale  of  an  Odys- 
sey through  monasteries  and  hospitals  and 
prison  houses,  of  picaresque  adventures  with 
highwaymen,  with  thieving  priests,  with  rag- 
ged player-folk,  with  peasant  girls.  It  is  a 
study  of  character  because  from  the  first  to 
the  last  the  comedy  and  the  adventures  only 
serve  to  throw  into  relief  the  mental  growth 
and  development  of  him  wh,o  first  viewed  Italy 
with  the  uncomprehending  eyes  of  a  child  and 
who  wound  up  by  understanding  a  great  deal 
and  loving  yet  more.  The  book  somewhat  re- 
calls "The  Forest  Lovers."    Each  is  a  tale  of 

144 


THE  FOOL  ERRANT 

chivalry,  th,e  one  in  an  age  of  chivalry,  the 
other  in  a  so-called  age  of  reason.  Mr.  Hew- 
lett has  been  peculiarly  happy  in  his  scheme. 
To  have  set  Strelley  adrift  in  the  England  of 
Pope  and  Swift,  would  have  been  to  have  lost 
much.  But  you  take  this  Francis,  a  lad  of  21, 
"eldest  son  and  third  child  of  Squire  Antony 
Strelley  of  Upcote,  a  Catholic,  non-juring  re- 
cusant, stout  old  gentleman  in  Oxfordshire;" 
give  him  plenty  of  money  in  his  pocket  and 
books  of  poetry  in  his  valise,  make  him  good- 
looking,  good-tempered,  with  blue  eyes  and  a 
notable  chin,  make  him  too  serious  for  laugh- 
ter and  too  innocent  for  sin ;  you  take  him  and 
turn  him  adrift  in  pagan  Italy  where  he  un- 
derstands the  people  not  at  all  and  where  they 
at  first  totally  fail  to  understand  him  and  what 
do  you  have? — sundry  and  exciting  adven- 
tures ;  sundry  love  affairs  in  which  he  alone  is 
blind;  troubles  amany,  and  finally  that  peace 
which  comes  with  understanding. 

At  the  beginning  it  is  possible  to  say  of 
Strelley  what  Brandes  has  said  of  a  some- 
what similar  character  in  German  fiction :  "He 
is  repeatedly  saved  from  temptation  simply  by 
his  ignorance  and  inexperience.  He  never 
realizes  what  is  going  on  around  him.    Things 

M5 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

happen  to  him  without  his  doing  any  thing 
to  bring  them  about.  He  is  the  central  figure 
of  a  group  of  characters  who  all  pursue  call- 
ings which  leave  them  as  free  as  he  is  him- 
self." 

It  is  only  when  he  is  no  longer  free,  only 
when  he  becomes  involved  in  the  lives  of 
those  about  him,  that  his  eyes  begin  to  open. 
It  is  this  which  makes  the  author's  concep- 
tion so  difficult.  Strelley  comes  dangerously 
near  to  being  an  impossible  character.  It  is 
one  of  Mr.  Hewlett's  achievements  that  he 
does  not  allow  Strelley  to  lapse  into,  a  mere 
burlesque  figure. 

This  young  dreamer,  thinking  no  evil,  has 
always  maintained  that  "women  are  as  far 
above  our  spiritual  as  they  are  fatally  within 
our  material  reach."  When,  therefore,  he  is 
thrown  into  contact  with,  the  pretty  wife  of 
his  host  and  guardian,  Dr.  Lanfranchi,  he  is 
content  to  adore  her.  He  seeks  no  farther  and 
gets  nothing  else.  He  keeps  as  holy  relics 
little  trifles  of  hers — a  h,air  ribbon,  perhaps, 
a  little  worn  slipper.  For  her  sake  he  learns 
Italian.  He  reads  the  Italian  classics  with  her. 
He  is  richly  rewarded  for  his  devotion  when 
he  may  kiss  her  hands.    Finally,  the  innocent 

146 


THE  FOOL  ERRANT 

tells  her  he  loves  her.  To  this  Italian  woman 
to  whom  love  means  deep  passion,  he  says 
prettily:  "I  am  at  my  prayers,  in  my  church, 
before  my  altar.     Your  eyes  are  the  candles, 

your  heart  is  the  altar  stone.     I  kneel " 

The  exquisite  irony  of  this  situation  is  that 
while  hearing  the  poetical  rhapsodies  of  Strel- 
ley  as  he  puts  his  Aurelia  upon  a  throne  and 
worships  her,  the  reader  is  also  gradually  and 
slyly  taken  behind  the  scenes  by  the  author. 
He  peeps  into  Aurelia's  heart  and  sees  her  for 
what  she  is,  desirous  and  denied;  provocative, 
full  of  allure,  and  yet  deemed  a  saint;  a  trick- 
ster and  yet  held  for  betrayed;  a  passionate 
Italian  woman,  bored  to  extinction  by  her 
husband,  and  yet  dreamed  of  as  a  loyal,  loving 
wife.  It  is  only  after  many  misadventures 
and  misunderstandings  that  it  comes  to  Strel- 
ley  with  a  shock  that  his  Aurelia  is  no 
Beatrice ;  that  he  has  been  held  for  a  fool,  in- 
deed, and  that  he  has  behaved  like  a  Galahad 
where  he  was  expected  to  act  like  a  Lance- 
lot. It  comes  to  him  like  a  plunge  in  icy 
water  to  hear  the  dry  Italian  common  sense  of 
another  woman  in  commenting  upon  his  ac- 
tions: "If  this  is  what  comes  of  reading 
your  Dante,  I  advise  the  'Song  of  Solomon.' 

147 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

I  have  never  opened  the  'Divine  Comedy' — 
still  less  the  'Vita  Nova;'  but  I  consider  th,e 
author  a  donkey,  and  am  sure  that  was  the 
opinion  of  his  Donna  Beatrice." 

Now  what  is  the  beginnng  of  this  folly? 
Simply  this,  that  on  th,e  night  Strelley  avowed 
his  boyish  love  for  Aurelia,  he  remained  too 
late  in  her  apartments  and  heard  the  formid- 
able Lanfranchi  coming  up  the  stairs.  In  ut- 
ter confusion  he  was  hustled  into  a  cup- 
board, so  that  he  could  slip  away  afterwards 
unheard  and  unseen.  Now,  while  the  saintly 
Aurelia — embryonic  Cleopatra — was  wheedling 
her  husband  into  a  good  humour — it  came 
upon  the  fool  in  th,e  cupboard  that  he  had 
wronged  this  lady  by  his  avowal  of  love. 
Ecco !  he  would  step  out  of  the  cupboard  and 
tell  this  half-appreciative  husband  that  he  is 
wedded  to  th,e  youngest  of  the  angels.  No 
sooner  conceived,  than  done!  Here  is  room 
for  a  pretty  piece  or  comedy  and  Mr.  Hew- 
lett has  lost  none  of  his  chances  in  the  telling. 
Galahad  is  kicked  out  by  the  angry  professor. 
Strelley  with  his  body  sore,  but  with  his  eyes 
still  close-shut  to  the  truth,  dreams  of  but 
one  quest  in  life,  a  foolish  and  quixotic  quest, 
to   seek  out  Aurelia  and  restore  her  to  her 

148 


THE  FOOL  ERRANT 

lord.  This  quest  of  Aurelia  takes  him  all  over 
Tuscany.  He  consorts  with  thieves  and  the 
lowest  of  the  low,  without  smutching  his  soul. 
He  peddles  crucifixes.  He  falls  in  with  the 
formidable  Fra  Palamone,  a  vagrant  and 
criminal  churchman.  He  joins  the  strolling 
players.  He  sees  the  inside  of  prisons  and 
hospitals.  Restored  once  of  twice  to  the  posi- 
tion he  could  occupy  by  right,  he  lives  for  a 
time  in  the  great  world  of  polish,  and  of 
smiling  corruption,  of  cynical  noblemen  and 
their  clever  mistresses,  only  to  disappear  once 
more  and  take  up  the  humble  work  of  car- 
pentering in  Lucca.  Of  course,  in  the  end  he 
finds  Aurelia  and  disillusion,  but  before  that 
he  finds  her  who  is  to  count  finally  for  the 
most  and  best  in  his  life, — Virginia  Strozzi, 
a  half-starved  peasant  girl.  Now,  amid  all 
these  adventures,  his  character  gradually  takes 
on  true   virility.     He   gradually  acquires  the 

deeper  wisdom.     It  is  Virginia  who  teaches 

him  much, — the  service  that  true  love  gives, 

the  pains  it  will  endure,  the  sacrifices  it  will 

make.     Mr.   Hewlett  manages  through  Strel- 

ley's  wanderings  not  only  to  paint  a  picture 

of  1 8th  century  Italy  in  its  manifold  aspects 

149 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

of  high  and  low  life,  but  how  these  things  af- 
fect Strelley  himself. 

Strelley  differs  from  other  Hewlett  men  in 
that  service  women  give  him  does  not  seem 
the  main  thing  in  the  world.  For  him  there 
is  something  more  in  existence  than  love  ad- 
ventures. He  has  a  gallant  conception  of  life 
and  of  rules  of  conduct;  religion  to  him  is 
something  more  than  lip-service.  With  proud 
humility  he  can  say: 

"I  have  been  bare  to  the  sh,irt  and  yet 
proved  my  manhood,  beaten  like  a  thief  and 
yet  maintained  myself  honest,  scorned  by  men 
and  women  and  yet  ready  to  serve  my  fellows, 
held  atheist  by  the  godly  and  yet  clung  to  my 
Saviour's  cross." 

Virginia  Strozzi  is  another  of  the  typical 
Hewlett  women.  Sh,e  is  beautiful.  She  is 
content  to  serve  her  heart's  lord.  She  is 
meek,  she  is  lowly,  she  is  satisfied  to  endure 
hunger  for  her  lover's  sake;  to  suffer  disgrace 
for  him;  nay,  to  sacrifice  her  very  woman- 
hood for  h,im. 

She  is  described  as  handsome  in  a  fine,  thin 
way,  but  the  author  is  not  quite  consistent  in 
his  portrait,  for  later  in  the  book  when  Vir- 
ginia is  gowned  in  borrowed  finery,  he  tells 

150 


THE  FOOL  ERRANT 

th,e  reader  that  she  looked  the  patrician  with 
her  "refined  beauty."  Futhermore,  he  allows 
her  to  quote  poetry,  and  to  speak  of  "pietisti- 
cal  aptitudes."  Such  things  as  these  are  not  in 
character.  They  produce  a  false  note,  the 
more  so  as  Virginia  says  to  h.er  lover:  "I  am 
a  little  peasant  and  shall  always  be  a  little 
peasant."  This  statement  by  her  is  true. 
Where  the  author  does  not  intrude,  she  has 
the  peasant  common-sense  and  the  peasant 
hpnesty  and  loyalty.  Nay,  she  even  has  a  gift 
of  altruistic  sacrifice  of  self  which  Mrs.  Edith 
Wharton  avers  is  not  characteristic  of  the 
Latins. 

The  other  important  and  dominant  charac- 
ter in  the  book  is  Fra  Palamone.  There  are 
some  figures  in  the  Hewlett  novels  that  are 
purely  literary.  They  are  drawn  from  books 
rather  than  from  life.  There  is  a  certain  di- 
abolical cleverness  expended  upon  their  crea- 
tion but,  however  hard  the  author  tries,  the 
reader  is  never  quite  sure  they  could  have  an 
existence  outside  of  romance. 

Palamone  is  a  figure  in  whom  Stevenson 
would  have  delighted.  Palamone  boasts:  "I 
am  known  all  over  Tuscany  for  the  most 
wheedling,    good-natured,    cunning,    light-fin- 

151 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

gered  and  light-hearted  old  devil  of  a  Capu- 
chin that  ever  hid  in  St  Francis'  wound  *  *  *  * 
the  waxing  moon  sees  me  skipping,  and  you 
will  no  more  keep  me  long  off  the  road  than 
your  cur  upon  it.  I  must  be  out  and  about 
*  *  *  *  with  a  nose  for  every  haughty 
savour  and  an  ear  for  every  salted  tale." 

His  wit  is  of  the  order  of  Chaucer's  Pardon- 
er. A  peddler  of  relics,  he  pokes  fun  at  his 
trade. 

This  laughing,  joking  Capuchin  can  be  grim 
enough,  sardonic  enough,  savage  enough  when 
occasion  requires.  He  will  serve  in  any  way 
for  gold.  He  will  kidnap  a  lad  whom  the 
authorities  wish  out  of  the  way,  or  act  as 
pander  to  a  nobleman's  lust.  He  will  be 
blithe  companion  or  tyrannical  master;  savage 
opponent  or  skilful  nurse.  All  in  all,  Mr.  Hew- 
lett's hand  never  drew  a  firmer,  clearer  pic- 
ture of  a  remarkable  character,  but  again — un- 
gratefully— did  Palamone  ever  exist,  and  if  so 
was  it  in  18th  or  in  15th  century  Italy? 

On  the  whole,  "The  Fool  Errant"  is  a 
charming  book,  producing  in  bulk  the  impres- 
sion that  it  is  what  it  purports  to  be, — the 
memoirs  of  Francis  Strelley,  written  in  the 
1 8th  century. 

152 


THE  FOOL  ERRANT 

Mrs.  Edith  Wharton  holds  that  Mr.  Hew- 
lett's methods  are  too  positive  and  too  strenu- 
ous for  a  novel  dealing  with  the  18th  century, 
a  century  of  nuances. 

"Colours  had  paled,"  says  she,  "voices  been 
lowered,  convictions  subdued;  in  Italy  es- 
pecially, if  one  may  trust  the  social  records 
of  the  day,  people  lived  au  jour  le  jour, 
taking  pain  and  pleasure  lightly,  and  without 
much  sense  of  the  moral  issue." 

Mr.  Hewlett  has  shown  people  taking  pain 
and  pleasure  lightly, — Giraldi  at  his  best, 
Aurelia  before  she  is  thwarted, — but  he  has 
also  chosen  to  show  that  human  beings  are 
very  much  alike  in  all  ages  when  their  strong 
feelings  are  aroused.  The  mellow  humour  of 
a  Goldoni,  the  urbane  elegance  of  an  Alfieri 
may  determine  the  tone  of  a  literature,  but 
they  do  not  determine  the  expression  of  a  pas- 
sion. 


153 


THE  STOOPING  LADY. 


ALL  of  these  novels  possess  in  common  at 
least  one  characteristic,  th,at  of  recall- 
ing the  writings  of  other  authors.  This 
suggestiveness,  however,  is  much  stronger  in 
some  classes  than  in  others,  Sometimes  it  is 
a  feature  of  style;  often  it  is  a  similarity  of 
incident,  or  a  likeness  in  character  drawing; 
now  and  then  it  is  safe  almost  to  say  that  a 
certain  personage  could  not  have  been  created, 
had  it  not  been  for  the  existence  of  some  other 
novelist's  work;  and  occasionally  striking 
parallels  of  considerable  length  can  be  pointed 
out  between  him  and  others." 

This  passage  in  a  recent  book  concerning 
George  Meredith,  might,  with,  slight  modifica- 
tions, be  applied  in  certain  cases  to  Mr.  Hew- 
lett. It  has  been  pointed  out  in  the  course  of 
this  study  how  Mr.  Hewlett  has  time  and 
again  challenged  comparison  with  great  names 
in  literature.  So,  in  1907,  when  "The  Stooping 
Lady"  appeared,  Mr.  Hewlett  was  universally 
called  a  Meredithian. 

154 


THE  STOOPING  LADY 

In  certain  surface  ways  there  was  undoubt- 
edly a  resemblance  to  the  great  man's  work, 
But  after  all,  "The  Stooping  Lady,"  is  the 
output,  not  of  a  censor  of  his  age,  not  of  a 
cynical  satirist,  not  of  a  castigator  of  senti- 
mentalism  and  of  egotism,  but  of  a  poet  and 
romanticist  to  whom  there  is  nothing  so 
beautiful  in  the  world  as  the  love  of  lovely 
woman. 

Is  th,ere  a  complex  story  in  "The  Stooping 
Lady,"  a  plot  with  its  devious  interwindings 
and  complications,  such  as  Thackeray  and 
Dickens  and  Meredith  have  given?  Bared  to 
the  bones,  as  it  were,  the  novel  is  a  series  of 
incidents : — Hermia  Mary  sees  a  butcher  fight- 
ing a  pair  of  tipsy  young  lordlings ;  she  learns 
th,at  he  is  imprisoned  for  resenting  the  staking 
of  his  horse ;  she  acts  upon  a  quixotic  impulse 
and  goes  to  his  shop  to  apologize  for  the 
wrongs  her  relatives  have  inflicted  upon  him; 
she  is  wooed  by  violets  sent  by  an  unknown 
giver,  and  falls  in  love  with,  him  who  conceived 
the  poetic  thought;  she  meets  her  lover  and 
acknowledges  him  her  lord;  she  hears  him 
speak  at  a  reform  meeting  and  is  rescued  by 
him  when  a  melee  ensues ;  she  stands  by  his 
side  when  he  is  put  in  the  pillory  for  inciting 

155 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

to  riot  and  leaves  just  before  a  stray, — or  is  it 
a  purposed? — bullet  kills  her  lover. 

That  is  the  bare,  gleaming  skeleton  of  the 
story!  It  takes  the  true  artist  to  clothe  on 
the  outlines,  th,e  poet  to  give  it  colour  and 
beauty,  the  born  creator  to  make  it  the  vivid, 
entrancing  thing  it  is.  The  book  is  a  far  cry 
from  "Evan  Harrington,"  with  which  it  is  so 
often  compared.  Rose  Jocelyn  stooped  to 
Evan  Harrington,  just  as  Hermia  Mary 
sought  to  stoop  to  David  Vernour.  The  one 
gives  the  viewpoint  of  the  aspiring  tailor,  the 
other  that  of  the  stooping  lady.  "Evan  Har- 
rington," in  all  ruiman  probability  suggested 
the  theme  of  the  later  book,  but  they  are  dif- 
ferent in  purpose,  different  in  treatment,  and 
different  in  effect. 

Harrington  is  a  satire  from  beginning  to 
end.  Meredith,  the  fun-maker,  Meredith  the 
castigator  of  human  frailties,  Meredith  the 
farceur,  Meredith  the  cynical  observer  of  life, 
here  allows  himself  to  revel.  The  Countess 
de  Saldar,  matched  in  English  fiction  only  by 
Becky  Sharp,  is  pilloried  for  all  to  see  and  her 
lies  are  exposed  one  after  th,e  other  with  ruth- 
less skill.  Harrington  himself  is  pinned  to  a 
card  and  allowed  for  a  time  to  squirm.    Read- 

156 


THE  STOOPING  LADY 

ers  are  cynically  shown  that  humans  are  all 
very  much  alike  under  the  skin, — gentlemen 
are  often  innately  vulgar;  vulgarians  are 
often  gentlemanly.  If  Meredith  displays  him- 
self the  social  satirist,  Mr.  Hewlett  places 
himself  on  record  as  the  ardent  republican,  as 
th.e  man  who  scorns  social  caste. 

How  poor  a  thing  is  Harrington  when  com- 
pared with  Vernour!  Harrington  would  be  a 
gentleman.  Vernour  proclaims  himself  a  man. 
Harrington  grows  through  his  contact  with 
the  nobility  of  Rose.  Vernour  is  full  grown, 
but  displays  his  best  side  when  there  is  a  call 
for  it  in  the  wooing  of  Hermia.  Rose,  agreeable 
figure  that  she  is,  does  not  win  love  as  does 
the  Hewlett  heroine.  Rose  scorns  tradesmen. 
She  sneers  at  them.  Only  by  degrees  does 
she  accustom  herself  to  the  fact  that  Harring- 
ton is  not  born  a  gentleman.  She  is  ready  to 
believe  base  things  of  him,  attributing  them 

to  his  blood.    She  is  ready  to  marry  some  one 

else  when  her  family  urge  the  advantages  of 

position  and  wealth. 

Not  so  with  Hermia  Mary,  hot  little  rebel 

by  reason  of  her  Irish  father  and  the  pretty 

mother  wh,o  broke  with  her  family  to  elope 

157 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

over  the  garden  wall  with  her  lover.  No 
sneers  at  tradesmen  come  from  Hermia's  lips ! 

"He's  the  butcher,  miss." 

"Oh  then  that  was  he — that  young  man — " 

"Yes,  miss." 

"And  who  were  the  other  two,  the  two 
cowards  attacking  him?" 

It  is  intimated  that  they  were  gentlemen 
and  were  drunk,  something  to  be  taken  into 
consideration. * 

"Pooh!"  answers  Hermia.  She  is  not  afraid 
of  the  people,  nor  does  she  scorn  them.  She 
speaks  of  her  fellow  passengers  on  a  coach  to 
London  from  the  north  and  as  one  who  knows 
them  well.  This  girl  is  the  elemental  woman, 
passionate,  essentially  feminine,  true  as  steel 
to  the  man  she  loves,,  knowing  no  social  bar- 
riers and  no  qualms.  She  stands  ready  with- 
out question  to  give  up  for  her  chosen  lover 
everything  woman  holds  dear;  nay,  she  does 
give  up  her  dear-held  pride.  She  endures  for 
Vernour;  she  suffers  with  him. 

The  canvasses  are  different  in  the  two  books 
also.  "Harrington"  has  many  figures.  There 
are  John  Raikes,  the  Cogglesby  brothers  and 
the  Great  Mel  himself  to  recall  Dickens  and 
his  methods.    There  are  also  a  host  of  minor 

158 


THE  STOOPING  LADY 

characters.  On  the  contrary,  the  vital  figures 
in  "The  Stooping  Lady"  are  comparatively 
few.  It  was  not  without  reason  that  an  En- 
glish reviewer  suggested  that  the  book  might 
well  have  been  called  "Lady  Morfa."  The  tale, 
such  as  it  is,  deals  with  the  loves  of  Hermia 
Mary  and  Vernour,  but  the  figures  revolve 
around  the  impressive  one  of  the  old  dowager, 
a  perfect  character,  sister  to  those  in  the  pages 
of  Thackeray. 

"The  Stooping  Lady"  is  rich  with  many 
things  Mr.  Hewlett  has  taught  himself.  Mod- 
ern though  the  style  of  it  may  be,  compara- 
tively free  from  the  mannerisms  that  appealed 
to  the  artist  in  him,  it  yet  abounds  in  the 
best  things  he  has  always  given, — beauty  of 
phrasing,  nimbleness  of  wit,  delightful  dialogue, 
and  care  in  character  drawing.  With  the  wis- 
dom that  has  always  marked  his  work,  he  has 
chosen  a  period  rich  in  colour,  1809 — when 
national  consciousness  and  class  consciousness 
were  both  at  their  highest  point  in  England; 
when  Napoleon  was  still  something  more  than 
a  bogey  to  good  Englishmen,  when  a  great 
deal  was  being  heard  about  the  rights  of  fran- 
chise and  the  rights  of  man. 

This  stir  in  the  souls  of  men  is  deftly  in- 

159 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

dicated.  There  are  hints  of  the  growling  of 
Hazlitt.  Cobbett  appears  and  there  are  imag- 
inary quotations  from  him.  A  glimpse  is 
caught  of  Parson  Tooke,  that  "hoary  old  spi- 
der." There  are  faint  echoes  of  the  battles 
between  Whigs  and  Tories. 

It  is  precisely  at  this  time,  when  men  are 
most  passionately  alive  to  the  questions  of 
caste  and  human  rights,  that  Hermia  Mary 
Chambre  of  the  house  of  Caryll,  Lady  Morfa, 
her  grandmother,  and  David  Vernour  play 
out  their  little  drama  of  human  love  and  sorrow 
and  suffering. 

And  first  as  to  Hermia  herself.  With  what 
a  sure  touch  and  with  what  perfect  ear  for 
music,  by  the  way,  Mr.  Hewlett  christened 
her.  Hermia  Mary !  Hermia  Mary !  the  read- 
er rolls  the  sweet  syllables  on  the  tongue, 
just  as  did  her  lover.  And  what  infinite  pains 
Mr.  Hewlett  has  taken  to  make  her  credible, 
to  make  her  alluring  to  the  reader.  The  nov- 
elist himself  in  his  own  proper  person  des- 
cribes her;  then  as  Vernour  saw  her  and 
Captain  Ranald,  Lord  Rodono  and  Lord  Sand- 
gate, — lovers  all.  Then  from  another  angle 
there  are  glimpses  of  her  in  the  diaries  of  Mer- 
vyn  Touchett  and  the   gossip  of  Pink   Mor- 

160 


THE  STOOPING  LADY 

daunt.  Lastly  she  is  seen  in  her  own  conver- 
sation and  in  those  letters  which  drip  with 
her  personality,  her  fun,  her  wit,  her  deep 
feeling.  Her  bright,  brave  spirit  when  it  is 
moved  to  action,  her  nobility  of  soul  when  she 
is  touched,  move  the  author  to  poetry.  Noth- 
ing less  than  poetry  will  suffice  her  admirers 
in  describing  her.  Even  Pink  Mordaunt,  club 
gossip,  is  touched  by  her  girlish  gallantry.  It 
is  necessary  thus  to  expend  treasure  of  words 
upon  her  creation.  Otherwise  the  story 
would  have  lacked  convincement.  It  needed 
all  the  preliminary  groundwork  to  prepare  for 
the  essential  poesy  of  that  romantic  garden 
scene  in  which  she  "seals  her  indentures."  It 
needed  all  the  persuasive  powers  of  the  author 
to  make  his  readers  forget  the  butcher  in  her 
lover. 

She  is  endowed  with  beauty,  with  the  hot 
colouring  and  the  dark  eyes  of  her  father, 
with  the  dark  tresses  of  her  mother's  race. 
Each  of  her  lovers  sees  something  of  her 
physical  charm.  "She's  got  eyes  like  a  mid- 
summer eve — eyes  with  fires  dancing  in  'em — 
eyes  alight,"  exclaims  one. 

She  has,  too,  a  pretty  and  uncommon  wit. 

The  author  is  not  content  with  saying  that 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

she  possesses  this  gift.  He  gives  proof  of  it. 
Her  early  happy  letters  abound  in  it.  She  is 
met  by  a  row  of  flunkies  at  her  grandmother's 
home:  "A  giant  to  each  door,  and  a  row  of 
white-headed,  flaming-breeched  giants  in  the 
gallery;  a  groom  of  the  chambers  to  herald 
any  silly  errand  to  grandmamma — vexatious, 
Mary !  I  feel  like  a  parcel  from  the  country — 
fresh  butter,  perhaps, — handed  about  from 
man  to  man,  from  coach  to  coach  and  de- 
livered at  last,  greasy  and  thumbed,  to  my 
purchaser." 

Or„  again,  on  the  eternal  and  absorbing 
question  of  clothes,  telling  of  what  she  saw  at 
a  rout: 

"My  sweet  cousin,  you  never  saw  such 
gowns,  or  such  absence  of  gowns — literally 
abandoned!  Mrs.  Fancourt  was  there,  like 
Venus  rising  from  the  sea — happily  some- 
where near  the  waist  line  she  thought  better 
of  it  and  the  rest  remained  under  muslin." 

But  beauty  can  be  shallow  and  wit  can  be 
heartless.  This  girl  is  neither  shallow  nor 
heartless.  She  is  noble, — noble  in  the  better 
meaning  of  the  word,  not  in  the  vapid  sense 
employed  by  the  aristocrats  by  whom  she  is 
surrounded. 

162 


THE  STOOPING  LADY 

This  is  what  is  to  be  expected  from  a  girl 
so  deeply  and  reverently  in  love  with  a  father 
who  spoke  to  her  thus  wisely:  "I  see  you  a 
woman  grown,  my  child;  I  see  you  a  lover. 
Manhood — womanhood — and  the  call  of  the 
heart  between;  you  will  never  be  false  to 
that.  Love  worthily,  love  well,  love  the  best. 
Love  truth,  love  justice,  my  Hermia  Mary; 
hate  like  the  devil  those  three  children  of 
his — Cant,  False  Privilege,  and  Treachery  to 
the  Truth  that  is  in  you."  And  again:  "If 
you  stoop,  Hermy,  stoop  nobly." 

When  the  time  came,  despite  the  creed  of 
her  caste,  despite  the  protests  of  her  family, 
despite  precedent,  she  knew  her  own  heart, 
she  knew  what  she  had  to  give  and  what  she 
chose  her  butcher  hero  to  take.  There  was  no 
faltering.  She  summed  herself  and  her  story 
up  in  her  own  beautiful  words:  "Either  one 
loves  or  one  doesn't;  either  one  is  loved,  or 
is  not.  And  if  one  is  loved  in  so  beautiful  a 
way  that  must  mean  the  lover  is  noble.  And 
if  one  loves — even  if  one  loves  an  impossible 
person,  as  you  say — if  one  loves  with  all  one's 
heart,  and  is  grateful,  and  is  humble — there 
can  be  no  harm.    At  least,  I  can  see  none." 

Such  is  Hermia  Mary,  a  greater  than  the 

163 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

fair  Jehane,  because  her  conduct  is  more  ex- 
plicable and  more  convincing;  in  some  ways 
a  greater  than  Queen  Mary,  because  she  is 
entirely  the  author's  own,  with  no  ground- 
work of  history  on  which  to  build. 

Over  against  Hermia's  character,  the 
author  has  set  that  of  Lady  Morfa,  a  masterly 
portrait  in  a  different  style.  Old  where  Her- 
mia  is  young,  a  defender  of  caste  where  Her- 
mia  wishes  to  break  down  the  barriers,  she 
is  brought  into  collision  with  the  girl  through- 
out the  book.  How1  like  a  Thackerayan  dowa- 
ger she  is:  "In  person  she  was  thin,  not  tall, 
and  very  much  like  an  eagle,  with  a  nose 
sharp,  bony  and  prominent,  with  eyes  black, 
hard,  and  deeply  set,  which  were  capable  of 
an  unswerving,  unblinking  and  rather  terrible 
scrutiny  of  persons  and  things.  She  could 
blink  them  too,  bitterly  when  she  chose;  and 
her  lips,  which  were  thin,  had  a  way  of  twitch- 
ing very  elfin  to  behold.  Lastly,  she  stooped 
to  a  crutch,  called  you  'My  Dear,'  said  ex- 
actly what  she  pleased,  never  concealed  her 
opinions,  and  was  absolutely  candid  as  to  her 
tastes,  which  were  coarse,v  and  her  labhor- 
rences,  which  were  three.     I  have  mentioned 

164 


THE  STOOPING  LADY 

them   before:    enthusiasm,   slackness   of   fibre 
and  treachery  to  Family." 

Such  was  this  great  Whig  lady,  "a  Whig  of 
the  Whigs,  dotting  all  the  i's  in  the  sacred 
words  British  Constitution." 

No  wonder  she  divided  mankind,  for  all 
purposes,  into  two  classes: — "Either  you  were 
Family,  or  you  were  a  person." 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  consider  the  other 
characters  in  the  book.  The  author  expended 
his  best  powers  upon  the  two  women.  Per- 
fectly capable  of  painting  a  large  canvass, 
with  crowds  of  figures,  he  has  here  contented 
himself  with  the  portraits  of  the  heroine  and 
her  grandmother.  Even  the  hero  of  the  book 
is  shadowy  compared  with  what  Mr.  Hewlett 
could  have  done  with  the  part  had  he  desired. 
But  it  is  precisely  here  that  the  author  exer- 
cises an  exceedingly  clever  trick  in  his  artistry. 
Vernour  wins  Hermia  Mary  because  to  her 
he  remains  a  more  or  less  intangible,  semi- 
mysterious  figure,  invested  with  a  certain 
glamour.-  Vernour,  with  just  the  right  in- 
stinct, leaves  himself  very  largely  to  the  im- 
agination. So,  too,  Mr.  Hewlett  leaves  the 
butcher  very  largely  to  the  reader's  imagina- 
tion. 

165 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

The  reader  is  placed  in  the  same  category 
with  Hermia  Mary.  He  is  forced  to  see  Ver- 
nour  very  much  as  she  did.  By  so  doing,  the 
love  story  becomes  credible. 

He  understands  the  magic  that  worked  upon 
the  high-spirited  girl.  Only,  having  allowed 
it  to  work,  Mr.  Hewlett  was  not  true  to  him- 
self, not  true  to  life^  and  not  honest  with  his 
readers.  There  is  really  no  excuse  for  the 
killing  of  Vernour,  save  the  author's  desire  to 
get  rid  of  him.  His  death  did  not  spring  from 
the  necessities  of  the  story.  What  one  master 
of  fiction  wrote  to  another,  is  applicable  here. 
Robert  Louis  Stevenson,  writing  on  Novem- 
ber i,  1892  to  Mr.  J.  M.  Barrie  penned,  these 
wise  words: 

"If  you  are  going  to  make  a  book  end  badly, 
it  must  end  badly  from  the  beginning.  Now, 
your  book  began  to  end  well.  You  let  your- 
self fall  in  love  with,  and  fondle,  and  smile  at 
your  puppets.  Once  you  had  done  that,  your 
honour  was  committed — at  the  cost  of  truth 
to  life  you  were  bound  to  save  them.  It 
is  the  blot  on  'Richard  Feverel,"for  instance, 
that  it  begins  to  end  well ;  and  then  tricks  you 
and  ends  ill.  But  in  this  case,  there  is  worse 
behind,  for  the  ill  ending  does  not  inherently 

166 


THE  STOOPING  LADY 

issue  from  the  plot —  the  story  had,  in  fact, 
ended  well  after  the  great  last  interview  be- 
tween Richard  and  Lucy, — and  the  blind,  il- 
logical bullet  which  smashes  all,  has  no  more 
to  do  between  the  boards  than  a  fly  has  to  do 
with  a  room  into  whose  open  window  it 
comes  buzzing.  It  might  have  so  happened; 
it  needed  not;  and  unless  needs  must,  we  have 
no  right  to  pain  our  readers." 

"The  Stooping  Lady"  had  ended  well  after 
that  last  great  scene  where  Hermia  Mary 
stood  beside  her  lover  who  was  fastened  in 
the  pillory;  she  thus  proclaimed  to  all  the 
world  how  her  heart  stood.  The  bullet  which 
killed  Vernour  was  quite  as  blind  and  illogical 
as  the  one  which  Stevenson  denounced. 

Commenting  upon  this  book,  its  author  once 
said:  "It  is  good  writing,  but  it  is  not  good 
novel  writing."  Mr.  Hewlett  himself,  to  the 
contrary,  and  despite  its  ending,  this  novel 
is  an  entrancing  little  book  concerning  one  of 
the  most  radiant  girls  in  latter-day  fiction. 


167 


THE  SPANISH  JADE. 


IN  the  spring  of  1908  there  appeared  a 
little  volume — somewhat  over  the  protest 
of  its  author,  which  might  have  been  writ- 
ten ten  years  ago  so  far  as  its  manner  was 
concerned.  It  was  thoroughly  romantic  and 
dealt  with  Spain,,  as  formerly  its  author  had 
dealt  with  Italy.  In  fact,  it  was  a  veritable 
"Little  Novel  of  Spain.".  Going  back  in  time 
no  later  than  i860,  it  embodied  its  author's 
ideas  of  what  Spain  means,  that  "great,  roomy, 
haggard  country,  half  desert  waste  and  half 
bare  rocks  *  *  *  immemorially  old,  immutably 
the  same,  splendidly  frank,  acquainted  with 
grief  and  sin;  like  some  brown  gipsy  wench 
of  the  way-side,  with  throat  and  half  her 
bosom  bare,  who  would  laugh  and  show  her 
teeth,  and  be  free  with  her  jest;  but  if  you 
touched  her  honour,  ignorant  that  she  had  one, 
would  stab  you  without  ruth  and  go  her  free 
way  leaving  you  carrion  in  the  ditch." 

This  novelette  gives  the  essence  of  all  that 
he  has  seen  in  Spain,  read  in  its  literature, 

168 


THE  SPANISH  JADE 

perceived  in  its  people,  dreamed  of  its  spirit. 
Just  as  brief  trips  in  Italy  gave  him  a  firm 
grasp  of  the  atmosphere  of  that  country,  so 
short  vacation  journeys  in  Spain  gave  him 
an  insight  into  the  temperament  of  the  never- 
changing  Iberian  race.  Just  as  he  studied  the 
plastic  arts  of  Italy,  so  he  studied  the  fine 
arts  of  Spain.  Just  as  everywhere  in  Italy  he 
took  with  him  his  Dante  as  guide,  mentor  and 
spiritual  friend,  so  in  Spain  he  took  with  him 
his  Cervantes.  He  loves  "Don  Quixote,"  is 
full  of  it,  quotes  it.  This  book  evidently  in- 
spired his  travel  to  its  scenes;  evidently  sug- 
gested the  writing  of  a  Spanish  tale.  It  sup- 
plied him  with  one  of  the  happiest  touches  in 
"The  Spanish  Jade." 

"  T  have  here,'  says  his  hero  to  the  customs 
officer  upon  entering  the  town  of  Palencia,  'a 
shirt  and  a  comb,  the  New  Testament,  the 
History  of  the  Ingenious  Gentleman,  Don 
Quixote  de  la  Mancha,  and  a  tooth  brush.' 
Much  of  this  was  Greek  to  the  doganero,  who, 
however,  understood  that  the  stranger  was 
referring  in  tolerable  Castilian  to  a  provincial 
gentleman  of  degree." 

Mr.  Hewlett's  little  novel  appeared  from  the 
presses  about  the  same  time  as  Mr.  Havelock 

169 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

Ellis'  large  volume,  "The  Soul  of  Spain." 
The  reader  finds  quite  as  much  of  the  soul  of 
Spain  in  the  one  as  in  the  other.  In  a  way, 
it  almost  seemed  as  if  the  story  were  a  com- 
plement to  the  more  serious  and  more  critical 
book.  Almost  everything  that  such  a  trained 
observer,  traveler  and  critic  as  Mr.  Ellis  finds 
to  say  about  Spain  is  also  incorporated  in  the 
Hewlett  book.  What  Mr.  Ellis  says  about 
Spanish  women  is  proved  by  Manuela;  what 
he  says  about  Spanish  stoicism,  the  story 
bears  out.  Mr.  Ellis  calls  attention  to  the 
fact  that  Spain  is  not  another  Italy,  neither 
in  its  people,  its  scenery  nor  in  its  art  and 
literature.  He  dwells  upon  the  essential  fixity 
of  the  Spanish  character,  upon  the  differences 
between  the  Catalans  and  the  Aragonese,  as 
if  they  were  different  peoples.  Mr.  Hewlett 
speaks  of  "the  Spains  and  the  nations  which 
people  them."  Then  he  adds,  carrying  out 
the  very  thought  of  Mr.  Ellis:  "Behold  the 
Castilian,  the  Valencian,  the  Murcian  on  his 
glebe,  you  find  an  exact  relation  established, 
the  one  exhales  the  other.  The  man  is  what 
his  country  is,  tragic,  hagridden,  yet  impas- 
sive, patient  under  the  sun.  He  stands  for  the 
natural    verities.      You    cannot    change    him, 

170 


THE  SPANISH  JADE 

move,  nor  hurt  him.  He  can  earn  neither  your 
praises  nor  your  reproach.  As  well  might 
you  blame  the  staring  noon  of  summer  or 
throw  a  kind  word  to  the  everlasting  hills. 
The  bleak  pride  of  the  Castillano,  the  flint  and 
steel  of  Aragon,  the  languor  which  veils  its 
Andalusian  fire — travelling  the  lands  which 
gave  them  birth,  you  find  them  scored  in 
large  over  mountain  and  plain  and  river-bed, 
and  bitten  deep  into  the  hearts  of  the  in- 
dwellers.  They  are  as  seasonable  there  as  the 
flowers  of  waste  places,  and  will  charm  you  as 
much." 

"The  Spanish  Jade"  is  touched  and  con- 
trolled somewhat  by  the  spirit  and  traditions 
of  Spanish  literature.  Even  as  in  his  ro- 
mances of  old  time,  Mr.  Hewlett  followed 
Chaucer  and  William  Morris  in  their  fond- 
ness for  heroines  with  grey  eyes,  so  in  the 
present  Spanish  novelette,  he  has  a  heroine 
whose  physical  characteristics  are  those  of  the 
women  of  Spain's  great  books.  She  is  a  girl 
with  tawny  hair  and  sea-green  eyes,  this  be- 
ing the  type  that  has  always  appealed  to 
Spanish  writers  as  the  most  beautiful  and 
most  aristocratic.  But  Mr.  Hewlett  has  neith- 
er   slavishly    copied    Spanish    literature,    nor 

171 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

the  popular  type  seen  in  the  "Carmen"  of 
Merimee  and  Bizet.  It  is  true  there  is  in  this 
story  a  girl  who  is  part  gipsy,  even  as  Carmen 
is,  but  in  some  ways  she  is  more  the  real 
thing,  her  deeds  seem  more  probable.  Manu- 
ela  is  not  solely  a  seductive  beauty  with  a  wild 
reckless  heart  filled  with  lustful  passion,  and 
with  murderous  hate  when  denied  what  she 
desires.  Mr.  Hewlett  has  not  created  an- 
other Carmen.  He  loves  women.  Loving,  he 
also  pities.  It  is  not  in  his  heart  to  depict 
any  woman  without  some  redeeming  touches, 
without  something  that  shows  they  are  not 
entirely  bad.  In  many  ways  this  poor  Manu- 
ela  is  a  Spanish  and  unhappier  Isoult  la  Des- 
irous. Isoult  went  through  troubles  amany 
in  a  forest  world  of  medieval  times.  She  was 
surrounded  on  all  sides  by  lustful  men  thirst- 
ing for  her  beauty.  However,  she  was  fortun- 
ate enough  to  be  preserved  from  the  fate  these 
beasts  of  the  chase  willed  for  her.  This  was 
not  so  in  the  case  of  this  Spanish  Isoult,  who, 
it  is  true,  was  of  base  birth  where  the  heroine 
of  "The  Forest  Lovers"  was  revealed  in  the 
end  as  a  Countess.  This  girl  of  Spain  in  the 
sixties  had  never  had  a  chance  in  life.  She 
had  never  known  a  good  human  being.  Mother, 

172 


THE  SPANISH  JADE 

unfrocked  priest,  wandering  student, — all  were 
evil  and  all  saw  in  her  only  a  pretty  piece  of 
merchandise,  And  Manuela  was  so  well 
worth  saving!  She  was  so  grateful  for  the 
small  favour  of  an  honest  kiss  and  a  wholesome 
word.  She  was  so  touched  by  a  glimpse  of 
a  world  where  girls  can  remain  clean.  She 
was  heroic  with  the  proud  heroism  of  her  race. 
Loving  Manvers  for  whose  sake  she  com- 
mitted murder,  ready  to  be  as  wax  in  his 
hands,  she  must  needs  be  honest  with  him  and 
with  herself;  she  must  needs  stand  up  in  court 
and  willingly  say  things  about  herself  which 
she  knows  must  reveal  to  him  all  of  her  piti- 
ful, wretched  story.  It  is  not  so  much  her 
beauty  as  her  proud  humility  that  wins  for 
her  the  sympathy  of  the  reader. 

Some  of  the  other  characters  are  direct 
descendants  of  forebears  in  Spanish  literature. 
There  is  Esteban  Vincaz,  the  villain  of  the 
piece,  a  true  picaresque  character,  a  criminal 
and  bully,  with  "the  look  of  a  seraph  when  he 
sang."  Don  Louis  Ramonez  de  Alavia  is  also 
a  familiar  figure.  He  is,  of  course,  thin,  hol- 
low-eyed and  sallow;  he  is  first  cousin  to  the 
Archbishop  of  Toledo,  is  entitled  to  wear  his 
hat  in  the  presence  of  the  Queen, — and  lives 

173 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

upon  five  pence  a  day !  But  the  last  of  the  im- 
portant characters  in  the  book  is  the  author's 
own.  Gil  Perez,  the  hero's  valet,  speaks  in 
dialect,  a  perilous  undertaking  for  the  author. 
The  effort,  on  the  whole,  is  successful. 

The  droll  Spanish-English  serves  to  bring 
out  the  fun  of  the  character.  Mr.  Ellis  says 
that  Don  Quixote  and  Sancho  Panza  still  re- 
main all  there  is  of  Spain.  He  says  one  can 
see  the  Quixotes  and  the  Panzas  on  every 
high-road.  If  Don  Luis  has  some  of  the  at- 
tributes of  the  immortal  Don,  Gil  is  a  blend 
of  both  characteristics.  In  serving  his  master 
he  is  as  matter  of  fact,  as  literal,  as  faithful  as 
ever  Sancho  was.  In  his  wooing  of  Manuela, 
in  the  poetry  it  stirs  up  in  his  heart,  he  is 
kinsman  of  Quixote.  He  takes  the  foreground 
in  the  novel  along  with  the  "Jade"  herself. 
It  is  he  who  provides  for  Manvers;  he  who 
finds  Manuela  when  she  has  sought  to  disap- 
pear; he  who  loves  her;  he  who  saves  Man- 
vers' life  and  who  provides  for  Manuela's 
future. 

Osmund  Manvers,  the  Englishman,  who 
sets  himself  atilt  against  Spanish  ways,  is  a 
stage  Englishman.  The  author  comments  on 
his  clean  shirt,  his  extra  change  of  linen,  his 

174 


THE  SPANISH  JADE 

books  ,but  the  truest  touch  is  conveyed  in  a 
sentence.  It  is  the  very  essence  of  the  chiv- 
alry of  the  Protestant  Englishman  in  Catholic 
Spain  where  woman  is  often  considered  a 
baggage  and  where  parades  in  honor  of  the 
Virgin  are  so  frequent.  Manvers  sees  a  band 
of  ruffians  abuse  Manuela  and  there  breaks 
from  him  this  exclamation :  "Damn  him!  I've 
a  mind . .  And  they  pray  to  a  woman!" 

Notwithstanding  this  sign  of  real  life,  Man- 
vers is  somewhat  wooden.  He  is  too  stolid. 
Caught  up  in  a  net  of  circumstances  by  his 
chance  meeting  with  Manuela  and  twice  saved 
by  her  from  the  assassin's  bullet,  he  is  blind 
to  the  love  she  bears  him,  bestows  her  upon 
Gil  and  goes  his  thoughtless  way  to  England 
and  its  more  prosaic  life.  Briefly  and  baldly 
outlined  the  story  seems  highly  melodramatic 
and  also  tenuous.  Told  by  Mr.  Hewlett,  it 
is  an  absorbing  narrative  giving  the  heady  es- 
sence of  all  that  is  romantic  and  poetical,  as 
well  as  savage  and  cruel,  in  Spain. 

Mr.  Arthur  Symons  gave  it  as  his  opinion 
that  "Carmen"  was  the  most  Spanish  thing 
since  "Gil  Bias."  It  is  a  strong  temptation  to 
add  that  the  story  of  Manuela  is  the  most 
Spanish  thing  since  "Carmen." 

175 


HALFWAY  HOUSE. 


HALFWAY  HOUSE,"  which  appeared 
in  1908,  was  a  complete  surprise  to 
those  friends  of  Mr.  Hewlett  to  whom 
he  had  intimated  that  the  novel  was  to  be 
completly  modern,  completely  different  and 
completely  shorn  of  all  those  things  which 
have  hitherto  been  put  down  as  Hewlettian. 
In  a  way,  it  was  his  complete  answer  to  the 
oft-repeated  assertion  that  he  could  not  pre- 
sent the  life  of  people  of  today  and  that  he 
could  not  work  without  the  extraneous  inter- 
est given  a  book  by  dint  of  casting  its  scenes 
in  faraway  eras  and  places.  "Halfway  House" 
was  a  surprise,  not  only  because  it  dealt  en- 
tirely with  the  England  of  the  present  time, 
but  also  because  of  its  method.  It  is  a  light- 
hearted  comedy  all  through, — albeit  touched 
with  the  shimmer  and  glamour  of  romance, 
inevitable  in  a  Hewlett  book.  Its  people  deal 
with  the  problems  of  today;  they  talk  the 
speech  of  today;   they  are  essentially  modern. 

176 


HALFWAY  HOUSE 

As  a  matter  of  course,  many  reviewers 
pigeon-holed  the  book  in  its  class  and  so 
breathed  easier.  They  adjudged  that  Hewlett 
was  now  a  confirmed  Meredithian,  that  he  had 
elected  to  follow  the  traditions  fixed  by  the 
wizard  of  Box  Hill,  had  chosen  Meredithian 
themes  and  played  with  them  in  Meredithian 
manner. 

Now  that  is  not  quite  true.  If  to  look  upon 
life  with  smiling  eyes;  to  tell  stories  with  wit 
and  humour;  to  garnish  their  telling  with  a 
style  that  has  tricks  and  graces  of  its  own  be 
Meredithian,  then  is  Mr.  Hewlett  a  follower 
of  the  master  so  recently  dead.  But  there  are 
other  things  to  be  considered.  Mr.  Hewlett's 
style  is  not  so  dazzling  and  elliptical  that  it 
obscures,  as  so  often  happens  in  Meredith's 
novels.  Futhermore,  his  characters  do  not 
constantly  scintillate  with  wit  and  epigram 
any  more  than  persons  do  in  real  life ;  and  still 
furthermore,  while  Meredith's  comedies,  like 
Dickens'  novels,  are  constantly  freighted  with 
some  serious  study  of  some  grave  problem  of 
the  day,  Mr.  Hewlett's  two  so-called  Meredith- 
ian books,— "The  Stooping  Lady"  and  "Half- 
way House," — have  been  stories  pure  and 
simple.     No  great  life  problem  has  been  at- 

177 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

• 

tacked ;  no  thesis  of  philosophy  expounded.  If 
there  is  any  moral  in  the  two  books  it  is: 
"Don't  seek  to  stoop  to  the  person  you  love; 
don't  seek  to  step  out  of  your  class;  that  way 
sorrow  lies." 

And  Mr.  Hewlett  seems  to  enforce  this 
moral,  although  in  the  two  books  he  rather 
displays  himself  a  radical  who  cares  little  for 
caste  and  has  little  sympathy  with  its  preju- 
dices. If  he  injects  his  own  personality  into 
the  books  at  all,  it  is  to  sympathize  with 
Hermia  Mary  for  her  fearless  course  in  her 
love  episode,  and  with  Mary  Middleham  for 
the  trials  she  had  to  face  in  the  new  circle 
of  society  to  which  her  aristocratic  husband 
introduced  her. 

But  to  go  into  these  things  is  to  take  the 
book  too  seriously. 

"Halfway  House,"  should  be  considered 
purely  as  a  book  of  comedy;  a  comedy  in 
which  Blackheath  manners,  morals,  and  ways 
of  looking  at  life  are  contrasted  with  those  of 
Mayfair;  a  comedy  in  which  there  is  that 
funny  scene  where  an  aristocratic  old  lady 
condescends,  only  to  be  snubbed  by  a  resident 
in  Suburbia;  a  comedy  in  which  life  is  seen 
as    a    play    in    which    ridiculous,    fortuitous 

178 


HALFWAY  HOUSE 

chances  and  accidents  change  and  colour  the 
whole  of  existence,  making  for  happiness  or  the 
reverse ;  a  comedy  in  which  all  little  strivings 
and  bickerings  are  food  for  ironic  laughter, 
and  in  which  humans  appear  to  the  eye  of  the 
beholder  as  dolls  dressed  up  and  smirking. 

The  main  theme  of  the  story  is  not  new. 
Mr.  Hewlett  has  not  been  prodigal  in  his  in- 
vention. The  plot  has  been  often  used. 
Whatever  value  it  has  is  that  it  is  presented 
from  the  Hewlettian  standpoint.  It  is  the  in- 
dividual touches  he  has  put  into  it  that  count. 
The  theme  may  best  be  happily  and  poetically 
indicated  by  this  quotation  which  illustrates 
the  dream  of  John  Germain,  a  gentleman  of 
fine  landed  estates  in  Berks.  Here  is  how  the 
man  of  fifty  thinks  of  the  maid  of  24: 

"The  nymph  Mero,  let  us  say,  was  sought 
by  the  God  Sylvanus,  who  wooed  her  in  a 
well-watered  vale.  Or  a  young  shepherdess 
— call  her  Marina — was  the  dear  desire  of 
Cratylus  the  mature,  who  offered  her  with 
touching  diffidence,  the  well-found  hearth,  the 
stored  garners,  the  cellar,  for  whose  ripe  an- 
tiquity (alas !)  he  himself  could  vouch.  The 
maid  was  not  cold;  it  was  himself  who 
doubted  whether  he  were  not  frigid.     He  be- 

173 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

sought  her  not  to  despise  his  silvering  beard, 
the  furrow  in  his  brow.  Boys,  urged  he,  are 
hot  and  prone;  but  the  wood-fire  leaps  and 
dies,  while  the  steady  glow  of  the  well-  pressed 
peats  endures  until  the  morning,  and  a  little 
breath  revives  all  its  force.  Thus  Cratylus 
to  Marina  in  his  heart." 

There  was  no  grand  passion  here.  There 
could  not  be.  It  was  always  a  middle-aged 
man's  dream  of  a  home  with  its  ruddy  fire,  its 
mistress  with  welcoming  arms,  its  long,  studi- 
ous evenings.  Having  accomplished  one  kind 
of  tale  in  "The  Stooping  Lady,"  there  is  here 
the  reverse  in  the  story  of  the  stooping 
gentleman,  of  the  middle-aged  Cratylus  who 
loves — after  a  fashion — and  wins — after  a 
fashion — his  young  Marina  all  dizzy  with  the 
honour  conferred  upon  Blackheath  by  May- 
fair,  grateful  for  it,  touched,  able  to  give 
everything  in  return  but  the  one  thing  needful, 
— Love!  In  "The  Stooping  Lady"  the  author 
resorted  to  the  ancient  expedient  of  killing 
the  hero  because  he  did  not  have  the  courage 
to  allow  his  heroine  to  make  the  final  stoop. 

In  "Halfway  House"  the  stoop  is  ac- 
complished. John  Germain  is  always  con- 
scious of  it,  revels  in  it,  takes  an  aesthetic  de- 

180 


HALFWAY  HOUSE 

light  in  the  beautiful  picture  of  the  modern 
King  Cophetua  and  his  beggar  maid.  His 
first  wife  had  been  of  his  own  class,  one  very 
conscious  of  her  beauty,  seeking  her  pleasures 
where  she  might  find  them.  When  threatened 
by  the  disgrace  of  common  scandal,  the  young 
Germain  put  on  his  mask  to  conceal  his  feel- 
ings, lived  the  man  in  the  case  out  of  England, 
faced  every  sorrow  his  wife  might  bring  him, 
until  death  came  to  her  as  a  blessed  release  to 
him.  This  kind  of  experience  embittered  him. 
He  did  not  trust  the  women  of  his  caste.  So 
in  time  the  now  middle-aged  poet  came  to 
dream  of  one  who  would  some  day  sit  beside 
his  hearth,  indebted  to  him  for  everything, 
grateful  to  him  for  everything.  When  he  saw 
Mary  Middleham,  Mary  of  the  hunted  eyes, 
Mary  in  simple  gown,  he  was  convinced  that 
here  was  the  one  destined  to  be  the  comfort 
of  his  declining  years.  He  did  not  see  that 
his  love  was  a  matter  of  intellectual  choice ; 
did  not  realize  that  his  kisses  lacked  fire;  did 
not  understand  how  shocking  it  was  to  a 
young  bride  on  her  wedding  day  to  have  her 
husband  discourse  of  long  hours  when  she 
would  go  to  school  to  him  and  learn  French 
and  Italian.    In  other  words,  the  tragi-comedy 

181 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

of  John  Germain's  case  was  that  he  did  not 
realize  his  incapacity  for  love.  In  his  vision, 
the  beggar  maid  remained  always  loyal  and 
grateful  to  Cophetua.  He  did  not  foresee  that 
in  real  life  the  things  money  could  bestow 
upon  Mary  would  soon  be  taken  as  a  matter 
of  course;  that  after  a  time  she  would  not  be 
so  self  conscious  about  the  coronet  of  position 
he  had  placed  upon  her  pretty  head.  And 
then  what?  Mary,  become  used  to  her  new 
station, — by  dint  of  her  woman's  adaptability 
and  quick  wit, — looks  for  more. 

And  the  dream  is  done !  Cophetua,  now  old 
before  his  time,  sinks  back  into  the  comic- 
pathetic  position  of  father  to  his  wife.  But 
not  entirely.  He  has  not  the  father's  mag- 
nanimity. Rather,  he  has  the  husband's 
jealousy.  Germain  is  a  gentleman  with  a 
gentleman's  fine  instincts,  but  one  corner  of 
his  brain  has  been  warped  by  his  earlier  mat- 
rimonial experience.  Long  suffering  and  pain 
have  made  him  dread  a  repetition  of  the  buried 
past.  Simple  little  actions  on  the  part  of  his 
Mary,  which  if  explained  might  have  been 
smiled  generously  out  of  court,  seem  momen- 
tous to  him;  simple  flirtations,  due  more  to 
ignorance  than   design,  cause  fears  in   Mary 

182 


HALFWAY  HOUSE 

which  he  misinterprets.  He  buries  his  sus- 
picions and  his  trouble  deep  within  his  breast ; 
he  assumes  once  more  his  coat  of  armour  be- 
hind which  to  hide;  but  he  never  forgets,  the 
result  being  that  Turk-like,  after  death,  he 
seeks  to  keep  a  chain  upon  his  property — his 
wife — making  an  ungenerous  will  with  cad- 
dish clauses  in  it  that  make  his  world  stick 
tongue  in  check  and  leer  with  ironic  eyes. 
And  yet,  John  Germain  was  not  a  bad  man. 
He  was  a  good  man  as  men  go.  In  that  high 
comedy,  called  life,  his  career  and  his  nature 
had  been  twisted  and  distorted  by  fortuitous 
circumstances, — a  pretty  confession  left  un- 
made, a  foolish  telegram  left  undestroyed,  a 
husbandly  caress  left  unbestowed. 

In  the  ordinary  novel  when  man  and  wife 
are  unhappy,  there  is  the  inevitable  third  per- 
son to  make  the  inevitable  triangle.  This  story 
has  two  such  men,  Duplessis,  already  men- 
tioned, and  John  Senhouse.  The  novel's 
weakest  point  is  Hewlett's  handling  of  Duples- 
sis. He  does  not  convince  the  reader  that  so 
caddish  a  fellow  could  wield  such  an  influence 
over  Mary  Germain.  The  ex-nursery  govern- 
ess had  held  her  own  with  the  best  and  most 
spiteful  society  of  the  county.    It  is  therefore 

183 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

hard  to  believe  that  Duplessis,  by  his  inso- 
lence, could  always  make  her  feel  her  Black- 
heath  origin,  could  take  her  into  his  arms  and 
kiss  her  without  as  much  as  by-your-leave. 
The  Mary  who  had  grown  in  spiritual  insight, 
would  have  left  far  behind  the  ungentlemanly 
gentleman  of  her  early  surreptitious  flirta- 
tions. 

Senhouse,  who  appeals  at  once  to  her  heart 
and  her  mind,  to  her  emotions  and  her  imag- 
ination, wins  the  reader,  too.  Imagine  a  man 
who  looks  something  like  Robert  Louis  Stev- 
enson, who  wanders  in  strange  lands  and  in 
his  own  England  something  after  the  manner 
of  George  Borrow,  and  who  preaches  epi- 
gramatic  doctrine  something  like  Mr.  G.  B. 
Shaw  and  you  have  Senhouse.  A  Cambridge 
scholar,  who  for  the  most  part  foregoes  the 
society  of  the  learned;  a  rich  man's  son,  who 
scorns  wealth  and  position;  a  painter  and 
writer,  who  often  lives  on  what  he  earns  as 
a  tinker;  a  gentleman  vagabond,  who  scorns 
caste,  and  carries  his  belongings  in  a  little 
cart;  an  enthusiastic  botanist,  who  takes  the 
tight  little  island  as  his  garden;  a  real  man, 
who  is  always  a  gentleman,  Senhouse  is  the 
most  fascinating  character  in  the  book,  akin 

184 


HALFWAY  HOUSE 

somewhat  to  Mr.  W.  J.  Locke's  Paragot,  but 
delightful  and  original  nevertheless.  He  fas- 
cinates because  the  author  has  left  things  un- 
told. As  Mr.  Hewlett  once  pointed  out  in  con- 
sidering Stendhal,  it  is  precisely  the  things  left 
out  that  appeal  to  the  imagination.  It  is  Sen- 
house  who  is  Mary's  good  friend;  it  is  he 
whose  quiet  talks  compel  her  to  be  frank  with 
her  husband  and  to  face  the  overweening 
Duplessis  with  something  of  courage;  it  is 
he,  who  in  the  final  chapter  of  the  book  makes 
her  come  to  him  shyly  and  blushing,  as  meek 
virgin  choosing  the  master  whom  she  will 
gladly  serve.  For  Mary  is  still  the  maid  seek- 
ing a  master.  She  will  be  humble  when  she 
finds  him,  clay  for  the  potter's  hands,  to  be 
moulded  into  what  he  will. 

The  development  of  her  character,  from  the 
girlish  dweller  in  Suburbia,  casting  down  shy 
eyes  before  her  "betters,"  to  resident  in  May- 
fair  holding  her  own  with  the  best  of  them,  is 
cleverly  demonstrated.  Once  the  emptiness 
of  the  show  is  realized  by  her,  she  longs  for 
freedom  and  the  open  sky,  flowers  and  sun  and 
rain,  for  the  good  companionship  and  the  warm 
love  of  a  true  man,  for  the  essentials  of  life 
rather  than  its  superficialities  and  its  luxuries. 

185 


MAURiqE  HEWLETT 

She  is  willing,  if  she   can  find  these  things 
there,  even  to  occupy  a  tent  in  Vagabondia. 

It  is  at  this  point  that  the  novel  ends,  with 
Senhouse  calling  and   with  Mary  answering. 

"Halfway  House"  is  not  a  big  novel  in  the 
sense  that  some  of  the  great  vital  problems  of 
modern  life  are  illustrated  and  discussed.  It 
is  what  it  claims  to  bey — a  "comedy  of  de- 
grees." It  is  significant  in  its  author's  career 
because  in  many  ways  it  seems  to  be  the  half- 
way house  in  his  work.  From  this  house, 
looking  backward,  the  student  can  see  the  suc- 
cession of  romantic  novels  to  his  credit;  the 
books  in  which  he  reverted  to  a  past  that 
lent  itself  to  the  purposes  of  the  confirmed 
romanticist;  the  books  which  caused  him  to 
be  described  as  a  writer  who  opened  a  window, 
as  it  were,  into  the  Renaissance  era  and  allowed 
men  to  look  through  and  see  its  great  figures 
in  the  flesh — real  breathing  men  and  women, 
laughing  and  sorrowing,  fighting  and  loving, 
brought  to  life  by  a  magic  of  his  own. 

From  this  house,  looking  forward,  the  student 
— judging  by  the  author's  latest  work — may 
only  guess  that  Mr.  Hewlett  has  done  with  the 
past  and  is  going  to  concern  himself  hence- 
forth with  men  and  women  of  his  own  period. 

186 


OPEN  COUNTRY. 
THE  RUINOUS  FACE. 


BACK  of  the  stories  Hewlett  has  invented, 
back  of  the  style  in  which  he  has  related 
them,  there  has  always  been  that  in- 
definable thing  called  'personality."  His  books 
have  been  marked  with  an  individual  tang 
that  belonged  to  him  and  to  no  other.  In 
"Open  Country"  he  quite  frankly  revels  in  his 
own  ideas,  in  his  own  love  for  beautiful  words 
and  high  sentiments.  The  book  is  not  so 
much  a  novel  as  a  spiritual  autobiography. 
It  is  primarily  a  book  of  the  spirit, — fictionally 
that  of  John  Maxwell  Senhouse  the  hero;  actu- 
ally that  of  Hewlett,  the  creator.  He  reveals 
himself  as  an  individualist  studying  the  prob- 
lems and  feeling  himself  in  opposition  to 
many  of  the  beliefs  of  a  complicated  modern 
society. 

He  is  found  inserting  the  probe  into  insti- 
tutions and  establishments,  and  always  in  the 
true  comic  spirit.  He  is  seen  dropping  the 
acid  of  a  more  or  less  subtle  criticism  upon  the 

187 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

veneer  of  modern  civilization  and  showing 
what  is  underneath  the  somewhat  polished 
and  deceptive  surface.  But  more  than  all  this, 
Hewlett  quite  frankly  displays  himself  as  the 
beauty-intoxicated  poet,  revelling  in  outdoor 
England  as  a  garden  of  delights,  lovingly  tell- 
ing over  the  tale  of  its  charm  of  hedgerows, 
woods  and  streams.  He  is  still  a  romanti- 
cist, but  one  who  is  gradually  orienting  him- 
self in  the  world  about  him,  and  who  is  bidding 
a  final  farewell  to  the  gauds  and  the  glories  of 
medieval  days.  The  high  adventure  of  love, 
the  reverent  pondering  upon  God  in  His  Heav- 
en, the  heart-tug  of  ever-recurrent  beauty, — 
these  things  still  appeal  to  him,  but  so  do  the 
more  prosaic  subjects  of  politics  and  property, 
socialism  and  anarchy.  For,  after  all,  Hewlett 
has  not  been  able  to  escape  his  age.  It  has 
claimed  him  for  its  child.  Its  problems  have 
finally  obtruded  themselves  upon  his  notice 
and  he  is  beginning  to  express  his  opinions 
about  them. 

"Open  Country,"  the  second  of  a  trilogy 
dealing  with  the  life,  works  and  opinions  of 
John  Maxwell  Senhouse,  treats  of  a  period 
prior  to  "Halfway  House,"  is  less  frankly  a 
story  than  that  book,  and  depends  less  than 

188 


OPEN  COUNTRY 

it  upon  mere  plot.  Indeed,  in  the  newer 
volume  Hewlett  ranges  himself  quite  plainly 
as  a  psychologist.  The  interest  is  not  so  much 
in  what  the  main  puppets  do  and  say  as  in 
what  they  feel  and  think;  in  the  transforma- 
tion wrought  upon  their  inner  selves  by  the 
clash  of  their  desires,  beliefs,  hopes,  and  class 
traditions.  The  mere  story,  as  such,  can  be 
told  in  a  paragraph.  Senhouse  has  a  chance 
meeting  with  Sanchia  Percival,  becomes  her 
friend,  comrade  and  instructor  in  many  things, 
falls  in  love  with  her  in  somewhat  shadowy 
fashion,  and  gives  her  up  when  he  finds  that 
she  has  conceived  a  passion  for  Nevile  Ingram, 
already  unhappily  married  to  a  woman  of 
little  character  and  less  morals.  It  can  be 
seen  from  this  that  the  story  is  tenuous.  But 
it  is  precisely  this  story,  which,  after  all,  is 
very  possible,  that  is  the  occasion  for  the 
amazingly  long  letters  which  constitute  the 
chief  charm  of  the  book.  They  form  the  com- 
plete clue  to  the  soul  of  Senhouse,  the  dilet- 
tante tramp  who  has  given  up  riches  and 
society  for  the  fun  of  planting  exotic  flowers 
in  out-of-the-way-  corners  of  England  and  for 
the  adventures  to  be  had  on  the  winding 
white  roads.     Senhouse   is   more  of  a  talker 

189 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

and  writer  than  he  is  a  tinker  or  a  painter. 
When  interested,  he  is  ready  to  pour  out  in 
conversation  or  in  letters  everything  that  he 
has  felt  or  observed  or  dreamed  or  thought. 
Sanchia,  whom  with  vision-blinded  eyes  he  sees 
as  a  reincarnation  of  a  Greek  Goddess,  whom 
he  madly  invokes  as  his  Artemis  the  Bright, 
his  Artemis  Hymnia„is  adored  not  so  much  as 
a  woman  but  as  the  embodiment  of  his  dream 
of  virginal  purity,  all  unconscious  of  her 
chastity  and  her  charm.  She  inspires  the  best 
that  is  in  him  and  he  writes  exquisite  pas- 
sages that  read  like  poetry  in  solution.  He 
opens  to  the  girl's  young  and  growing  mind 
new  and  unexpected  vistas,  preaches  the  doc- 
trine of  the  freedom  of  the  individual,  and 
proclaims  that  he  has  cut  down  all  the  barriers 
that  hedged  him  about.  The  point  of  this 
"comedy  with  a  sting"  is  that  he  finds  in  San- 
chia too  apt  a  pupil.  Growing  wise  under  his 
tutelage,  she  feels  that  his  passion  for  her  is 
not  very  deep,  is  not  the  kind  in  which 
there  is  love's  last  clear  call. 

He  has  convinced  her  that  every  man  is 
honest  and  every  woman  good  when  in  love. 
He  has  proclaimed  that  under  present  laws 
to  offer  woman  marriage  is  to  insult  all  that 

190 


OPEN  COUNTRY 

is  best  and  noblest  in  her.  He  beholds  the 
girl  as  lovely  and  tells  her  so.  He  conceives 
her  as  saintly  and  desires  her  to  be  a  saint. 
But  by  doing  these  things  he  robs  himself  of 
any  chance  of  winning  her,  if  he  ever  really 
desired  to  do  so.  He  pushes  her  into  the 
arms  of  another  and  that  other  not  worthy  of 
her.  He  is  seen  as  the  anarchist  on  the  sub- 
ject of  marriage,  pleading  with  Ingram  to 
divorce  his  wife  and  marry  the  infatuated  girl. 
Finally,  last  and  most  crushing  irony  of  all, 
his  pleading  is  of  no  avail,  and  Sanchia  joins 
Ingram  without  benefit  of  clergy. 

The  main  psychology  of  the  piece  is  con- 
cerned with  Senhouse.  He  is  a  most  convinc- 
ing and  complete  figure.  In  his  mouth  is 
placed  the  expression  of  the  leading  ideas,  the 
ideas  one  feels  sure  are  to  recur  in  the  future 
Hewlett  novels.  Briefly,  these  are  a  passion- 
ate devotion  to  a  certain  pantheistic  concep- 
tion of  the  God-principle;  a  romantically 
anarchic  view  about  the  laws  of  property 
and  marriage;  an  intense  feeling  of  the  need 
for  greater  simplicity  and  temperance  in  liv- 
ing than  is  exhibited  by  men  of  this  century. 

To  a  certain  extent,  Senhouse  is  the  preach- 
er and  expounder  of  the  Hewlett  propaganda. 

191 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

Sanchia  is  a  slighter  figure.  She  is  more 
passive  than  active.  Her  creator  has  estab- 
lished for  her  a  certain  physical  charm,  a  cer- 
tain innocence — or  is  it  a  divine  ignorance? — 
a  certain  courage,  but  there  is  not  revealed  in 
the  book  quite  the  lure  that  she  is  supposed 
to  have  for  the  men  who  find  her  loveworthy. 
Her  remarks  are  too  often  common-place. 
There  is  nothing  of  the  Rosalind-quality,  but 
there  is  at  times  a  certain  naivete,  a  certain 
piquancy  and  there  is,  as  was  to  be  expected 
in  a  novel  of  psychological  tendencies,  the 
unfolding  of  the  gradual  development  of  her 
heart  and  mind.  The  lesser  characters,  who 
serve  to  throw  the  main  ones  into  clearer  re- 
lief, are  drawn  with  great  skill.  They  are 
human  and  convincing,,  painted  in  Hewlett's 
best  humourous  manner. 

On  the  whole,  "Open  Country"  affords  good 
entertainment.  It  is  a  book  of  beauty,  with 
passages  almost  lyrical  in  their  poetical  inten- 
sity. It  abounds  in  true  feeling  for  youth  and 
its  golden  passions.  It  has  paeans  in  honour 
of  nature  and  life  in  the  open.  It  is  a  roman- 
tic comedy  in  which  the  author  reveals  himself 
once  more  as  the  possessor  of  a  proper  wit, 
with  a  power  for  social  satire  and  humourous 


192 


OPEN  COUNTRY 

dialogue  that  arises  from  a  keen  and  true  un- 
derstanding of  English  castes.  He  gives  his 
readers  cause,  between  smiles,  to  stop  for 
serious  thought.  For  he  is  becoming  a  dis- 
secter  of  souls,  a  searcher  of  hearts,  a  prober 
of  minds,  at  the  same  time  that  he  is  ex- 
hibiting himself  as  a  propagandist  as  distinc- 
tive in  his  way  as  Meredith  and  as  romanti- 
cally anarchistic  as  any  man  of  his  time.  His 
goal  is  evidently  the  phychological  novel  of 
ideas — something  radically  different  from  his 
triumphs  in  the  novels  of  romance  and  action. 
In  "Open  Country"  he  has  taken  a  definite 
step  towards  his  new  goal. 

"The  Ruinous  Face"  lacks  the  romantic 
fervour  of  the  usual  Hewlett  story.  It  has, 
rather,  a  sort  of  classic  restraint,  a  calm  al- 
most severe  style  that  is  befitting  in  a  tale  of 
Helen  of  Troy.  This  piece  of  work  is  in  es- 
sence a  tragedy. 

In  Homer,  of  course,  Helen  is  presented  as 
the  sufferer  much  more  than  as  offender. 
The  Greeks  make  war  to  avenge  her  wrongs 
as  well  as  those  of  Menelaus.  The  chieftain 
regards  her  always  as  a  person  stolen  from 
him  and  deems  Paris  a  robber.  Helen  is 
drawn  as  a  woman  with  refinement  of  charac- 


193 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

ter  and  as  one  who  is  torn  by  homeward 
longings.  There  is  no  indication  of  her  feel- 
ing a  genuine  passion  or  even  affection  for 
Paris.  In  contrast  to  the  attitude  toward  Hel- 
en displayed  by  the  later  Greek  tragedians, 
who  represented  her  as  a  worthless  woman, 
Homer,  on  the  whole,  speaks  of  her  in  lauda- 
tory epithets.  In  the  regular  story  she  goes 
home  with  Menelaus  after  the  fall  of  Troy. 

Hewlett  has  taken  the  Homeric  conception 
of  the  honesty  of  Helen  and  a  Rhodian  tale 
of  her  suicide  and  builded  out  of  these  materi- 
als an  entirely  new  legend.  Helen  is  seen 
as  the  victim  of  her  own  great  beauty.  She 
is  presented  as  the  woman  longing  always  for 
warm,  human  friendship,  for  the  lover  who 
is  comrade  also.  She  is  one  who  day-dreams 
of  home  and  children.  But  her  dreams  are 
always  shattered.  Her  ruinous  face,  her  per- 
fect form  call  up  the  beast  in  men's  eyes  and 
hearts.  Paris,  Menelaus,  even  the  slave  who 
seemed  to  be  her  friendly  servitor,  all,  all  when 
the  test  comes  prove  lustful  instead  of  truly 
loving.  So  that  the  woman,  weary  of  her  eter- 
nal shame  at  their  hands,  goes  out  into  the  gar- 
den land  hangs  herself.  It  is  an  absolutely  origi- 
nal and  poignant  ending  to  an  ancient  story. 

194 


CONCLUSION. 


THE  Abbe  Huet  in  1678,  in  a  discussion 
of  the  works  of  Mme.  Lafayette,  gave 
the  following  definition:  "What  are 
properly  called  romances  are  fictions  of  love 
adventures,  written  in  prose  with  art,  for  the 
pleasure  and  instruction  of  readers." 

As  written  over  two  centuries  ago,  this 
definition  applies  in  the  main  to  most  of  Mr. 
Hewlett's  tales,  whether  they  be  little  novels, 
historical  chronicles  or  novels  of  manners.  In 
the  main  they  are  true  stories  about  love  ad- 
ventures,— "fond  adventures,"  as  Mr.  Hewlett 
calls  them. 

His  early  romances  are  the  kind  of  tales 
which  take  the  road  and  put  up  at  strange 
castles  and  crazy  huts,  rescue  women  in 
trouble,  as  often  as  not  fall  in  with  damsels 
in  distress,  who,  when  occasion  requires,  mas- 
querade in  boy's  clothes  like  any  Rosalind; 
they  are  books  which  have  deeds  of  derring-do 
in  battle  and  tournament  and  end  with  the 
love-crowned  play  of  the  hero  and  meek  maid. 

195 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

This  is  as  one  would  expect.  Mr.  Hewlett's 
early  reading  was  concerned  with  romantic 
authors.  He  was  well  versed  in  the  lore  of 
medieval  Italy  and  in  the  fabliaux  of  old 
France.  As  a  young  man,  he  was  a  lecturer 
and  reviewer  on  medieval  topics.  This  fact 
not  only  influences  his  style  and  his  choice  of 
subject,  but  his  manner  of  presenting  his 
themes.  Unlike  the  classic  novelists  of 
England,  he  does  not  dally  by  the  way,  in- 
dulging himself  in  disgressions,  interpolations 
and  reflections.  Like  some  jongleur  of  old, 
whose  audience  was  impatient  to  hear  the  finis 
of  the  tale,  he  takes  up  his  narrative  with  the 
doings  of  his  main  characters  and  marches 
swiftly  and  bravely  to  the  end.  But  he  Te- 
rrains always  the  jongleur.  It  is  for  this 
reason  that  the  I-tone  is  so  prominent  in  his 
work.  He  is  the  teller  of  tales,  establishing 
a  direct  relation  between  himself  and  you.  He 
has  fashioned  this  tale  for  your  delight.  And 
as  he  is  primarily  interested  in  tale-telling,  it 
follows  that  he  is  not  greatly  concerned  with 
the  proving  of  theses. 

Valera,  the  Spanish  novelist,  once  wrote  that 
it  was  bad  taste,  always  impertinent  and  of- 
ten pedantic  to  attempt  to  prove  theses  by 

196 


CONCLUSION 

writing  stories.  According  to  this  view,  the 
"purpose  novel"  is  so  much  the  less  a  novel 
and  so  much  the  more  a  sermon.  Mr.  Hew- 
lett's practice  agrees  with  this  dictum.  Mere- 
dith— whose  follower  Hewlett  is  now  accused 
of  being — differs  with  Valera.  His  stories  are 
thesis  novels. 

Of  Meredith,  Arthur  Symons,  one  of  the 
wisest  of  modern  critics,  said :  "Writing  prose 
then,  as  if  it  were  poetry,  with  an  endeavour 
to  pack  every  phrase  with  imaginative  mean- 
ing, every  sentence,  you  realize  will  be  an 
epigram.  And  as  every  sentence  is  to  be  an 
epigram,  so  every  chapter  is  to  be  a  crisis.  And 
every  book  is  to  be  at  once  a  novel,  realistic, 
a  romance,  a  comedy  of  manners;  it  is  to 
exist  for  its  story,  its  characters,  its  philoso- 
phy and  every  interest  is  to  be  equally 
prominent.  And  all  the  characters  in  it  are  to 
live  at  full  speed  without  a  moment's  repose; 
their  very  languors  are  to  be  fevers." 

Mr.  Hewlett,  too,  often  writes  prose  as  if 
it  were  poetry;  his  style  is  sometimes  not  en- 
hanced, but  marred  by  things  derived  from  the 
practice  of  poets.  But  he  avoids  the  Meredith- 
ian  mistake  of  having  all  his  people  talk  in 
epigram.     Mr.  Hewlett's  more  often  than  not 

197 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

speak  in  character.  They  do  not  go  about 
carelessly  emitting  brilliants.  And,  again,  in 
the  art  of  Mr.  Hewlett  not  every  chapter  is  a 
crisis.  On  the  contrary,  with  rare  exceptions, 
every  chapter  contributes  to  the  general  for- 
ward march  of  the  tale.  Like  Meredith,  his 
novels  are  at  once  realistic  and  romantic  and 
comedies  of  manners,  but  they  exist  for  the 
story  and  the  characters,  and  are  little  con- 
cerned with  philosophy.  Meredith's  designs 
have  always  been  great,  but  his  execution 
has  not  always  been  equal  to  the  plans  thus 
formed.  Mr.  Hewlett  has  been  more  modest 
in  his  designs  and  correspondingly  more  suc- 
cessful in  his  execution.  He  has  not  been 
concerned  for  originality  of  plot.  Hence  the 
frequent  challenge  of  comparison  with  great 
names  in  literature.  He  has  not  scrupled  to 
employ  great  historical  figures  and  he  has  not 
hesitated  to  violate  the  law,  seemingly  made  so 
absolute  by  Scott,  that  great  historic  figures 
must  take  a  minor  place  in  historical  novels. 
In  Mr.  Hewlett's  books  the  great  historical 
figures  are  the  main  actors.  It  is  the  minor 
personages,  invented  by  Mr.  Hewlett,  who 
throw  light  upon  the  springs  of  action  that 

198 


CONCLUSION 

supposedly  determined  the  course  of  Richard 
and  of  Mary,  Queen  of  Scots. 

In  "Buondelmonte's  Saga,"  a  reconstruction 
of  an  old  Florentine  event,  he  gives  some  in- 
sight into  his  method.  Indeed,  with  a  greater 
lack  of  reticence  than  usual,  he  permits  a 
glance  into  his  workshop :  "As  I  do  not  think 
the  worse  of  a  tale  because  it  may  be  true, 
so  it  is  no  detriment  to  it  in  my  eyes  that 
it  has  been  pieced  together  from  a  hundred 
scraps — remnants,  shavings,  bits  of  brick  and 
plaster,  a  sentence  torn  from  a  letter,  a  sharp 
saying  passed  into  a  proverb,  the  battered 
stump  of  an  old  tower,  the  memory  (not  gone 
yet)  of  wicked  old  hatreds  or  high  young 
loves.  One  may  assume,  I  take  it,  a  certain 
decorum  in  the  process.  The  raking  and 
scraping,  the  groping  and  poring  over  rub- 
bish heaps  and  rag-bags,  should  be  done  in 
decent  darkness,  where  a  man,  in  the  company 
of  the  shaded  candle,  may  shed  tears  with- 
out a  shameful  face;  the  work  has  its  poig- 
nancy; the  refashioned  thing  should  not  lack 
it  either.  What  my  own  may  want  in  this 
last  particular  I  am  not  bound  to  discuss  be- 
forehand. I  confess  to  the  raking  and  scrap- 
ing, to  the  shifting  and  piecing  together,  and 

199 


MAURIQE  HEWLETT 

will  own  to  a  wet  eye  or  so  if  you  press  me. 
No  more.  I  hope  that  I  have  got  the  dust 
away,  and  that  the  old  bones  are  none  the 
worse  for  my  galvanism.  They  were  great 
flesh  once." 

Precisely!  In  these  novels  there  is  a  touch 
of  morbidezza  which  sometimes  makes  the 
reader  feel  that  there  is  something  unreal  and 
strange,  something  that  the  author  sets  all 
his  powers  to  overcome.  And  he  does  over- 
come it  very  largely  by  dint  of  the  marvelous 
style  with  which  he  has  clothed  on  his  tales 
and  also  by  dint  of  the  fact  that  he  is  a  master 
of  atmosphere.  He  is  always  punctilious  in 
the  care  with  which  he  paints  in  his  back- 
grounds. He  gives  the  tone  and  temper  of 
the  times.  He  does  not  scruple  to  use  plain 
words  and  to  picture  ugly  deeds  in  getting  his 
effects.  He  is  not  prudish;  neither  is  he 
prurient.  His  men  and  women  are  veritable 
flesh,  subject  to  its  passions  and  its  lusts,  and 
in  its  gratifications  they  are  often  hurled 
down  life's  precipices. 

Now  what  of  the  characters  in  these  novels? 
Thomas  Hardy  smiles  at  Wessex  folk,  but 
he  loves  them  too  and  depicts  them  and  all 
their   ways.      Barrie    often    sheds   tears   with 


200 


CONCLUSION 

Thrums'  inhabitants,  but  he  is  content  to  re- 
veal their  humble  comedies  and  tragedies. 
Kipling,  in  the  main,  deals  with  the  Anglo- 
Indian  and  the  subject  races.  Meredith  and 
Mr.  Hewlett  are  cosmopolitans,  Mr.  Hewlettt 
more  so  than  the  older  man.  Italy  of  the 
Renaissance  and  the  post-Renaissance,  France 
of  the  crusades,  Scotland  of  Mary's  day,  Eng- 
land of  George  and  of  King  Edward,  these  are 
the  times  and  the  lands  that  have  occupied 
him. 

For  Mr.  Hewlett  youth  is  the  age  of  ages; 
woman  the  sex.  His  few  boys  and  girls  are 
not  the  close  studies  given  by  Barrie,  nor  the 
marvelous  ones  of  Meredith.  His  boys  and 
girls  are  really  not  young,  save  in  years. 
They  are  mature  in  knowledge,  raised  in  the 
forcing-house  of  the  hot  Italian  air  for  the 
most  part,  prematurely  wise,  prematurely  witty, 
and  gallant  or  sinful  as  the  case  may  be.  The 
typical  Hewlett  boy  is  Angioletto  in  "The 
Judgment  of  Borso,"  a  youth  well-equipped  in 
all  ways  for  life  in  the  Italian  courts.  Mr. 
Hewlett's  men  are  in  the  main,  "galliards," 
young,  hopeful,  adventurous,  pricking  forth 
into  the  world,  finding  fights,  wars,  obstacles 
and — woman.  They  are  gallant,  they  are  roman- 

201 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

tic  and — the  truth  must  be  told— of  a  certain 
English  stolidity  which  takes  the  sweet  ser- 
vice of  the  gentler  sex  too  much  for  granted. 
Prosper  le  Gai  marries  Isoult  and  forgets  her 
until  her  constant  service  and  her  growing 
beauty  force  themselves  upon  his  notice. 

So  with  Francis  Strelley  and  his  Virginia. 
So,,  too,  Osmund  Manvers,  in  his  wooden  way, 
accepts  the  sacrifices  of  Manuela  and  bestows 
her  upon  his  valet.  Richard  has  something 
of  this  in  his  relations  with  Jehane,  Bothwell 
with  Mary. 

Mr.  Hewlett's  art  is  an  aristocratic  art.  It 
does  not  deal  with  "common"  people  save  only 
as  the  most  minor  figures.  His  Isoult  is  dis- 
covered of  noble  birth.  His  Virginia's  beau- 
ty is  accounted  for  by  her  heritage  from  the 
Strozzi.  As  a  necessary  accompaniment  of  his 
romantic  youths,  are  his  swashbucklers,  gam- 
blers and  adventures, — Cavaliere  Acquamor- 
ta  in  "The  Fool  Errant,"  Brazenhead  in  the 
Canterbury  tales,  Mosca  in  "The  Judgment  of 
Borso." 

Mr.  Hewlett  is  mainly  interested  in  his 
women.  They  are  the  pivots  about  whom 
his  comedies  and  tragedies  move.  And  his 
treatment  of  them  differs  from  all  the  great 

802 


CONCLUSION 

contemporary  novelists.  Kipling  gives  snap- 
shot photographs  of  women.  He  shows  them 
in  certain  brief  moments  of  their  existence,  in 
vivid  blacks  and  whites,  caught  on  the  instant 
whether  the  subjects  were  laughing  or  cry- 
ing. Stevenson's  few  women  are  presented 
in  silhouette.  Barrie  and  Hardy  give  etchings 
in  which  line  by  line  and  with  the  most  pains- 
taking art,  the  features  are  drawn.  But  Mere- 
dith and  Mr.  Hewlett  give  paintings  in  which 
brush  stroke  after  brush  stroke  has  been  used. 
The  reader  beholds  the  finished  work,  true  not 
only  in  features,  but  in  colouring. 

In  his  great  novels,  Hardy  has  been  obsessed 
with  the  half  pagan  idea  of  the  inexorable- 
ness  of  things.  His  women  are  almost  always 
the  playthings  of  inscrutable,  blind  fate, 
caught  up  and  often  whirled  to  their  doom. 
They  do  not  dominate.  "They  are  stray 
angels  in  bonds,  who  stand  forever  in  mortal 
fear  of  losing  their  reputations.  Social  law 
is  everywhere  in  conspiracy  against  their 
souls."  He  scarcely  believes  in  good  women 
and  bad  women.  He  sees  only  women  affected 
by  good  or  evil  circumstances. 

For  Meredith,  women  are  still  creatures  of 
the  chase;  but  he  pleads  for  a  nobler  sphere 

203 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

of  action  for  them;  he  mocks  modern  marital 
conditions;  he  would  see  woman  uplifted,  the 
comrade,  not  the  plaything  of  man.  He  has 
nothing  but  contempt  for  women  who  are 
ignorant  of  or  content  with  their  subjection. 

Now  Mr.  Hewlett  is  purely  medieval.  The 
Hewlett  woman  is  forever  the  plaything  of 
love.  She  is  always  in  the  attitude  of  the 
pursuing  who  is  pursued.  She  is  forever  the 
subject  of  passion,  holy  or  unholy.  Men  will 
fight  for  her,  plunge  kingdoms  and  cities  in 
war  or  ruin  for  her,  die  for  her.  Sometimes, 
as  in  "The  Stooping  Lady,"  she  is  the  willing 
object  of  this  love  and  stoops  to  enjoy  its 
divine  benison;  sometimes  she  flees  from  it 
when  it  displays  a  satyr  face  as  in  "The 
Duchess  of  Nona;"  sometimes  she  is  caught 
up  in  its  tragic  coil  as  in  "The  Queen's  Quair," 
and  destroyed  by  it.  Hewlett's  women,  like 
Hardy's,  are  stray  angels,  but  like  Meredith's 
they  are  creatures  of  the  chase.  And,  note 
the  difference  from  Meredith ! — this,  according 
to  the  gospel  of  Mr.  Hewlett,  is  as  it  should 
be. 

Since  it  is  woman's  proper  fate  to  be  loved, 
it  would  seem  to  be  impossible  for  Mr.  Hew- 
lett to  write  a  story  in  which  there  is  not  some 

204 


CONCLUSION 

romantic  love  interest.  And  in  each  case 
there  is  a  stoop  on  the  part  of  one.  The  stoop 
may  be  happy  or  the  reverse,  but  it  is  there, 
He  recurs  to  the  idea  again  and  again,  but 
each  time  with  a  difference  that  prevents 
monotony. 

In  the  main,  Mr.  Hewlett's  women  are  good 
women.  They  are  loyal  and  loving,  ready 
alike  to  take  beatings  or  kisses.  There  is  no 
ice  in  their  bosoms  which  must  needs  be 
thawed.  Nor  are  Mr.  Hewlett's  women 
"kind"  after  the  manner  of  the  Stendhal  char- 
acters. They  are  not  women  who  make  them- 
selves common.  For  the  most  part,  they  are 
Rosalinds  and  Perditas  of  an  humbler  sort, 
with  the  beauty  of  those  immortal  girls,  but 
without  their  supreme  wit  and  high  spirits. 
They  are  girls  who  are  stricken  down  with 
love's  dart  and  who  make  no  effort  to  remove 
the  dear  missiles.  They  are  true  dwellers  in  ro- 
mance-land, beautiful  creatures  who  give 
themselves  to  their  chosen  lords  without 
thought  of  sin  or  of  the  future. 

But  Mr.  Hewlett  is  not  only  successful  in 
depicting  characters.  He  has  wonderful  des- 
criptive powers.  He  fills  his  books  with  poetic 
allusions  to  wind  and  weather.     He  conveys 

205 


MAURICE  HEWLETT 

with  wonderful  skill  any  impression  received 
through  the  so-called  five  senses.  Alike  in 
battle  pieces  and  in  calm  pictures  of  an  Ital- 
ian dawn,  he  is  convincing.  It  was  for  these 
reasons  that  Mr.  Max  Beerbohm,  himself  no 
mean  user  of  English,  wrote: 

"For  sheer  artistry  in  the  use  of  words,  Mr. 
Hewlett  beats  anyone  since  Robert  Louis 
Stevenson   and    Walter    Pater." 

Hewlett's  masters  in  style  have  been  Sir 
Thomas  Browne,  the  Bible,  Don  Quixote  in 
English,  Mallory  and  Carlyle,  with  much 
culled,  by  the  way,  from  Dante  and  the  early 
Italians.  He  displays  at  times  the  gaudy 
splendor  of  Ruskin;  he  sounds  the  strident 
brass  tones  of  Carlyle. 

For  the  most  part  his  style  is  swift  in  move- 
ment. It  is  not  slow,  subtle  and  insinuating. 
It  does  not  bide  its  time.  It  leaps  at  the 
reader.  It  does  not  disdain  to  use  words 
culled  from  the  English  provinces,  from  the 
Scotch,  and  from  old  books  and  plays.  But 
whatever  its  sources,  hold  it  up  to  the  light, 
to  iadopt  a  phrase  from  Mr.  A.  B.  Walkley, 
and  this  style  displays  the  water  mark  of  Mr. 
Hewlett.  For,  after  taking  away  what  he  has 
learned  from  others,  after  deducting  what  is 

206 


CONCLUSION 

conciously  or  unconciously  reminiscent  of  his 
masters,  there  is  something  left  that  has  the 
tang  of  the  man's  own  personality,  that  makes 
the  reader  think  of  the  author  as  a  fact  in 
back  of  his  style. 

Style  can  not  be  placed  in  the  critical  test 
tube  and  analyzed*  any  more  than  the  chemist 
can  fully  explain  the  wonderful  wizardry  by 
which  the  rose  produces  its  colour  and  per- 
fume. The  reader  recognizes  a  certain  colour 
and  perfume  of  style,  so  to  speak,  which  this 
man  produces.  It  is  so  individual  that  it  has 
sometimes  produced  the  critical  folly  of  speak- 
ing of  it  as  "artificial  style."  Style,  of  course, 
in  its  very  being  is  artifice.  In  a  day  marked 
by  the  scribbling  of  novels  marred  a  hundred 
times  by  slip-shod  English,  the  critics  should 
rejoice  when  they  find  an  artist  who  delights 
in  fine  English,  who  tries  to  play  all  the  tunes 
of  which  the  superb  instrument  is  capable, 
who  follows  Pater's  demands  that  writers 
should  find  time  to  use  English  more  as  a 
learned  language. 


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